With both sides winning 2 of 5 games in BBL09, this is a huge clash for both sides in the context of their finals aspirations. The Scorchers are coming off an important away victory on the Gold Coast against the Heat as their bowlers dominated in the 40 run victory. They took 6 wickets from spinners with Ahmad the pick of the bowlers with 3 for 16 off 4 overs. The Scorchers have a settled squad at the moment and will go into this matchup with an unchanged lineup.
Meanwhile, the Hurricanes not only lost to the Heat at Blundstone Arena on Friday night but James Faulkner picked up a calf injury and will miss 2-4 weeks. As a result, Tom Rogers returns to the squad in the only team change for the away side. With no Wade or Archer this year, the ‘Canes depth is really getting tested so they’ll need a massive knock by the likes of Short, McDermott or Miller on Sunday night.
Perth Scorchers Squad (13): Mitch Marsh ©, Ashton Agar, Fawad Ahmed, Cameron Bancroft, Tim David, Cameron Green, Joshua Inglis, Matthew Kelly, Chris Jordan, Liam Livingstone, Joel Paris, Jhye Richardson, Ashton Turner
Hobart Hurricanes Squad (13): Ben McDermott ©, Qais Ahmad, George Bailey, Scott Boland, Nathan Ellis, Caleb Jewell, Riley Meredith, Simon Milenko, David Miller, Tom Rogers, Clive Rose, D’Arcy Short, Mac Wright
Scorchers vs Hurricanes Betting Tips
Scorchers
With the Scorchers sitting 5th on the table, they need to take advantage of home games like these as the finals near. In their 2 games at Optus Stadium thus far, they’ve scored 196 in an 11 run win over the Renegades and lost to the Sixers by 40 odd runs. After their performance with the ball on the Gold Coast, they do seem to have a well-rounded squad that should trouble the Hurricanes. Pretty much all of their bowlers did the job against the Heat as they bowled them out for just 109 in pursuit of 149. Speaking of the Heat, they recently scored 200+ against this Hurricanes bowling lineup and the Scorchers can potentially do the same if they bat first.
Livingstone hasn’t really fired yet this season but he can hit a ball. But even so, their middle order of Bancroft, Turner and Marsh can be hard to tie down in the middle overs. Looking at Ash Turner’s price to score over 10 runs, this seems like a very safe bet. He’s coming off back to back innings of scores over 10 and has scored 54 total runs in his 2 innings at Optus Stadium in BBL09. There’s also extra motivation here for Turner as he heads to India soon and will be keen for more runs to seal up a middle-order spot for the Aussies.
Hurricanes
Hobart will need to respond quickly after conceding the 3rd highest Big Bash total on Friday night against the Heat. The loss of James Faulkner in just the 4th over really hurt their ability to take wickets and the Heat dominated as a result. Faulkner also took 3 wickets in the last clash with the Scorchers so it’s a big loss. Especially with the likes of Archer and Wade on International duty.
Batting wise, they’ll be disappointed with the fact that all of their top 5 batsmen were dismissed in the 20s. So they’ll need one of those guys to make a big score in what should be a high scoring contest on Sunday night. That usually rests on the shoulders of D’A’rcy Short and he should enjoy a good batting deck in Perth. Interestingly, he also bowled 4 overs on Friday and that makes him an attractive play in the performance markets at BetEasy. He could easily score over 40 runs if he gets ahold of the Scorchers during the powerplay and can potentially pick up a wicket with his tweakers.
Short OVER 40.5 Runs
$1.80
Prediction
The odds present an expected tight affair with the Scorchers slight favourites at the moment. However, we believe the money will be on the home side as the Hurricanes will sorely miss the bowling of Faulkner. The Scorchers batting depth looks better on paper and their bowling attack showed their potential on Jan 1 in a dominant display over the Heat.
