Sydney Thunder Players Journey & Prep on BBL13 Spotlight

Sydney Thunder is another team from Sydney, participating in the Big Bash League. Many Legendary Sydney Thunder players have played from the Thunder team which include the Universe Boss Chris Gayle, Michael Hussey, Shane Watson, Dirk Nannes etc.

However, this team is not as successful as its rival team, but has been a part of various wonderful BBL seasons and matches.

Thunder has won the BBL trophy once in the 2015-16 season.

This blog will discuss the recent performances, current squad for upcoming season and its analysis, rivalry with Sydney Sixers, team preparation for the upcoming seasons, fans love for the team, and our prediction about the Thunder standing and performance in this season 13 of Big Bash League.

Sydney Thunder statistical Analysis in BBL History

Except for the Championship season of 2015-2016, Thunders have not been a top side. In most of the BBL seasons, they could not even qualify for the semi finals or Playoffs. The following table shows the season wise performances of Thunder in the BBL and their standings at the end of each season.

Season	Matches Played	Win	Loss	No Result	Points	NRR	Position	Finals
2011–12	7	2	5	0	4	-1.124	8th	DNQ
2012–13	8	0	8	0	0	-1.292	8th	DNQ
2013–14	8	1	7	0	2	-0.437	8th	DNQ
2014–15	8	2	5	1	4	-0.881	7th	DNQ
2015–16	10	6	4	0	12	+0.343	4th	Champions
2016–17	8	3	5	0	6	-0.316	8th	DNQ
2017–18	10	4	6	0	8	+0.034	6th	DNQ
2018–19	14	6	7	1	12	-0.067	6th	DNQ
2019–20	17	8	8	1	16	-0.013	5th	3rd
2020–21	15	8	7	0	16	+0.493	3rd	4th
2021–22	15	9	6	0	18	+0.443	3rd	4th
2022–23	15	7	8	0	14	-0.419	4th	5th

Sydney Smash:

Sydney Sixers and Thunders clash in the Sydney Smash BBL match that has developed a serious rivalry among the players and teams.

Even fans and citizens of this city are divided into their favourite team and rooting for them from stands in this high voltage clash.

Sixers have been a dominant side in this head to head clash and the following table shows a brief description of Sydney Smash previous records.

Sydney Thunder	Head to Head	Sydney Sixers
23	Total matches	23
7	Won	16
232	Highest Team Total	197
28	Lowest Team Total	76
Alex Hales (233)	Most Runs	Daniel Hughes (497)
Daniel Sams (17)	Most Wickets	Sean Abbott (25)

Sydney Thunder Players Squad for BBL 2023-24:

Thunders announced their final squad for the upcoming season of BBL a few days back and here is how it looks like.

Name	Role	Nationality	Batting style	Bowling style
Alex Hales	Batsman	England	Right-handed	Right-arm medium
Cameron Bancroft	Batsman	Australia	Right-handed	Right-arm medium fast
Ollie Davies	Batsman	Australia	Right-handed	Right-arm off break
Jason Sangha	Batsman	Australia	Right-handed	Right arm leg spin
David Warner	Batsman	Australia	Left-handed	Right arm leg break
Blake Nikitaras	Batsman	Australia	Left-handed	Nil
Alex Ross	Batsman	Australia	Right-handed	Right-arm off-break
Chris Green (C)	All Rounder	Australia	Right-handed	Right-arm off break
Daniel Sams	All Rounder	Australia	Right-handed	Left-arm fast medium
Matthew Gilkes	Bowler	Australia	Left-handed	Left-arm medium
Gurinder Sandhu	Bowler	Australia	Right-handed	Right arm fast medium
Nathan McAndrew	Bowler	Australia	Right-handed	Right-arm medium fast
Tanveer Sangha	Bowler	Australia	Right-handed	Right arm leg spin
Liam Hatcher	Bowler	Australia	Right-handed	Right-Arm Fast Seam
Zaman Khan	Bowler	Pakistan	Right-handed	Right-Arm Fast Seam

Key Sydney Thunder Players in the upcoming Big Bash League

The Thunder would highly depend on their experienced international players to give their best for the team.

The Sydney Thunder players has two experienced and world cup winning openers, Alex Hales and David Warner who would set the tone for the Thunders and Cameron Bancroft and Alex Ross will anchor and finish the innings.

Cameron Green who has been a consistent performer for the Thunders has been given the role of captaining the side this BBL season and he would be adding value with his spin bowling and some lower order hitting.

Another Sydney Thunder players to keep an eye on is Daniel Sams. He's an exceptional all-rounder who can contribute with both bat and ball.

Zaman Khan who has been picked up in the Overseas category has been phenomenal in the death overs and that would be interesting to see how he performs on Australian Pitches.

Preparation and Challenges for Thunder in BBL 2024

Now, talking about Thunders preparations for Season 13 of the BBL, the Management have done a fantastic job in picking up the players in the BBL draft that happened a few months back.

The top order of the teams looks solid and team overall performance would be depending alot on them.

However, Sydney Thunders squad lacks specialist All-Rounder who can perform with bat and bowl consistently. Green and Sams are not specialist quality All-Rounders and same goes for their bowling unit with no experienced fast bowler and spinner in the squad.

So, the overall team balance and individual performances need to be addressed.

Home Ground & Fans Support For Thunder

Thunders are based in Sydney, New South Wales, and have a passionate fan base that supports them through thick and thin. The team's home ground is the Sydney Showground Stadium.

This stadium is relatively smaller than other major cricketing arenas and stadiums in Australia.

However, the passionate fans and supporters of Thunders create a great environment. The Sydney Showdown Stadium has a seating capacity of around 26,000 and offers modern facilities and clear match viewing experience to the spectators.

Big Bash League 2023-24 Winning Prediction about Thunder

In terms of predictions for the upcoming BBL season, Thunders have a strong squad and players are in great touch.

They are definitely a contender for their second BBL trophy but it would be a very rollercoaster of a ride for them as Sydney Thunder will face issues in team combination and players injuries. Therefore, our prediction is that the Thunder team will do well but might finish in the bottom half of the table.