The Melbourne Renegades return home to Marvel Stadium for the first time in BBL09 on Sunday night, looking for their first win against a red hot Adelaide Strikers team.

Along with our famous FREE Cheat Sheets and Data Tools in our Data Tools section, new for the BBL09 season, Daily Fantasy Rankings presents the Draftstars Lineup Builder! Using our Data Tools and Projections you will be able to quickly build and import BBL teams into Draftstars by using the CSV upload. Access the Builder including tutorials on how the builder works by clicking the banner below.

Draftstars have $20,000 up for grabs in their main contest for a $15 entry, and $1,500 guaranteed for their popular $2 Mini. Moneyball have put up $5,000 for their $15 contest and $500 for their $2 buy in contest.

After their 0-3 start, the Renegades have made two changes to their squad of 13 with paceman Joe Mennie and all-rounder Will Sutherland replacing Jake Fraser-McGurk and Jack Wildermuth. While the Renegades will be unfurling last year’s BBL Champions Flag to celebrate their victory last summer, they will be desperate for their first win of the season after a third successive loss in Hobart last time out. Maybe a return to their home stadium will be the catalyst to get their season heading in the right direction.

In stark contrast the Strikers are undefeated in their first three matches and sit amongst the competition leaders. They have made one change, bringing in leg-spinner Liam O’Connor to replace paceman Harry Conway, although Conway was not in the final XI that defeated the Melbourne Stars on the Gold Coast.

Marvel Stadium was very hard work for batsmen last season. Innings scores are generally in the early 100s with few games going over the 150 mark. Although the pitch improved as the summer went on, it was generally slow with plenty in it for the seamers. This is reflected in the ground statistics on our Data Tools page, which show Marvel Stadium to have the worst average score among batsmen and the best average score among bowlers. While the curators may have improved the surface for this season, it would pay to consider these general trends when shaping your lineups.

Speaking of our Data Tools page, the Points Against tables for each team has been updated and there is a clear trend early in the season. The Renegades have given up plenty of fantasy points to their opposition, as you may expect having started the season 0-3. The Strikers on the other hand have been incredibly stingy against opposition bowling attacks but they do give up plenty of points to the opposition batsmen.

How fantasy coaches choose to manage this conflicting data with the general ground trend will be interesting and provide a varying spread of opinion.

Access our FREE Data Tools for Sunday's BBL Matchup here

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Batsmen

Love It – Shaun Marsh ($18,200 on Draftstars) 

Marsh is a quality player and is in good nick with scores of 42, 55 and 37 from his three hits this season. The team looks to build around him through the innings so given his class his floor is higher than most and should he cash in on a late flurry of shots he can really boost his innings strike rate. Spending up on your batting is something people may look to avoid given the Marvel history but Marsh is my pick if you want to go against this thinking.

Don’t Love It – Tom Cooper ($13,000 on Draftstars) 

Cooper chimed in with a couple of wickets last game but that wallpapered over the cracks that is his awful form with the bat to start the season. His overs are sporadic – he hadn’t bowled in the two games previously – and he slid down the order last game to number 7. Given his highest fantasy score in his last 10 games has been just 56, it is unlikely that he will be a player you regretted leaving out of your lineup.

Who Knows? – Phil Salt ($14,800 on Draftstars) 

Salt started to show glimpses last game of what the Strikers were hoping to get out of him when they brought him in to open the batting. Clearly he has the ability to break a game open with his approach to opening the innings but he comes up in a tough spot for batsmen. Absolute high risk high reward option here.

Bowlers

Love It – Kane Richardson ($18,400 on Draftstars) 

Richardson was a total monster last year at Marvel Stadium, taking 3 wickets on three separate occasions. He has returned in good form again this season, bowling economically across his three matches and taking an impressive 4/22 against the Scorchers in Perth. Richardson knows how to take wickets and if the pitch plays anything like last year he will be a major obstacle for the Strikers batsmen to negotiate.

Don’t Love It – Richard Gleeson ($12,800 on Draftstars)

What to make of Gleeson’s start to his Renegades career has been rather underwhelming and he only bowled one over against the Hurricanes last time. The Renegades have plenty of bowling options so I’m happy to wait for Gleeson to show a bit more than he has.

Who Knows? – Cameron Valente ($9,800 on Draftstars) 

Valente is very cheap given he bowled his full allotment of four overs last game and can feature with the bat if wickets are falling at the top of the order. Should the Marvel pitch play like it did last season then that would provide him with plenty of opportunity at this salary, but he is still a risky play given his low average of 21 fantasy points and relatively low ceiling. Potentially worth a roll of the dice.

 

 

 

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