The BBL11 action continues on Sunday as we head up to Spotless Stadium in Sydney to see the Thunder host the Melbourne Stars from 7.15pm. Mr. Cricket is back on deck with a full preview and betting tips below.
Remember to check out our Cricket Tips page regularly for updates throughout the BBL11 season as well as the Australian summer of cricket.
BBL11 Thunder vs Stars Betting Tips
Spotless Stadium, Sunday December 12th, 7.15pm (AEDT)
Sydney Thunder
Predicted XI: Alex Hales, Sam Whiteman, Matt Gilkes, Sam Billings, Alex Ross, Daniel Sams, Ben Cutting, Nathan McAndrew, Chris Green, Gurinder Sandhu, Tanveer Sangha
The Thunder will be looking to avenge their loss to the Stars on Friday night as they went down by four runs in a tightly contested match. With Usman Khawaja still out of the picture, I don't expect the Thunder to make too many changes to their line-up for Sunday night. Despite the loss, their line-up looks really settled, with Khawaja for Sam Whiteman or Matt Gilkes likely to be the only change for the majority of the year.
Their bowling unit was impressive in their first game, holding the Heat to just 140 off their 20 overs, but they struggled against the Stars, with three of their key bowlers going for 8+ runs per over including Daniel Sams, who went for a whopping 12.5 per over.
Melbourne Stars
Predicted XI: Marcus Stoinis, Joe Clarke, Nick Larkin, Glenn Maxwell, Hilton Cartwright, Andre Russel, Beau Webster, Nathan Coulter-Nile, Sam Elliot, Qais Ahmad, Adam Zampa
What a contrast in performances it was for the Stars in their first two games. They were absolutely decimated by the Sixers in the opening game of the season, losing by a whopping 152 runs away from home. They bounced back at the MCG on Friday night though, downing the Thunder with a completely new look line-up which was headlined by four massive inclusions in Marcus Stoinis, Nathan Coulter-Nile, Qais Ahmad and Andre Russel.
With those four players fit and firing alongside the likes of Glenn Maxwell and Adam Zampa, the Stars have one of the best looking squads on paper. Can they finally turn it into on field success though?
Match Prediction
Love the look of the Stars to go back to back against the Thunder here. They have opened as slight favourites but there is certainly still enough meat on the bone to make this a worthwhile bet at $1.81. Sydney are yet to play a game at Spotless Stadium this season, so I think the advantage of them playing at home is negated a bit as the pitch will be relatively unknown to both teams.
Melbourne have so many genuine match-winners in their new look line-up, and it only takes one of them to get going for them to win on any given night. Back them to win here at decent odds.
Melbourne Stars H2H
$1.81
Same Game Multi
Leg one of our multi will be Glenn Maxwell to score 20+ runs. Interestingly, Maxwell has scored 10+ runs in 59% of his innings dating all the way back to BBL07. That number only drops to 52% when you bump the mark up to 20+ runs though, which is by far the best percentage of any of the Stars batsmen. If Maxy gets to 10, he nearly always gets to 20.
The 2nd leg of our multi is Alex Hales to score 10+ runs. He has had a bit of a slow start to the season with just 10 runs through his opening two innings but he has an average of 22.29 against the Stars in seven career games and passes 10 runs in 71% of innings dating back to BBL07.
The final leg is our favourite once again in the first wicket to be caught. It missed in the last game but has saluted in 4/7 games so far while catches have made up over 70% of all wickets.
Maxwell 20+ Runs
Hales 10+ Runs
1st Dismissal - Caught
THU vs STA Same Game Multi
$3.40
