Sydney Thunder Women vs Melbourne Stars Women, 49th T20 Match Prediction 27 Nov 2019

This will be the battle of the low-ranked teams of the WBBL 2019-20. Both Sydney Thunder Women and Melbourne Stars Women have had a rather poor time in the ongoing season of the WBBL.

Sydney Thunder is placed 6th on the points table with 4 wins and 7 losses along with a Net Run Rate of -0.526. Melbourne Stars have fared worse and are right at the bottom of the table with only 2 victories and 9 losses along with a horrible Net Run Rate of -0.752. Melbourne Stars are already out of contention for the semi-final berth. Sydney Thunder has an outside chance but will need a near miracle for that to happen.

Sydney Thunder Women have now lost 6 games in a row after losing the one-over eliminator against Adelaide Strikers Women in their last game. Melbourne Stars Women won their last match against Melbourne Renegades Women to stop a 5-match losing spree. One can say that both the teams are almost equal in terms of form right now. However, when the two teams clashed earlier in the WBBL 2019-20 season, Sydney Thunder managed a comfortable win. Moreover, in the last 5 games between these two sides, Sydney Thunder Women has won 4 while one match was abandoned. Hence, the Sydney Thunder will have an edge in this contest.

This will be the first match of WBBL 2019-20 played at the Manuka Oval, Canberra. It remains to be seen how the pitch behaves. The pitch will not be a belter but the ball should come on nicely to the bat nicely. If the team batting first achieves a total of around 145-155, it could be a match-winning one. There have been some rains in Canberra in the last two days. However, the weather for the match is expected to be clear and windy.

While there has been only one T20I played at the Manuka Oval, Canberra, there have been quite a few ODIs played here. The venue has produced some high totals in the ODIs played here with South Africa's 411-4 against Ireland being the biggest total followed by Australia's 378-5 against New Zealand. The Sydney Thunder Women vs Melbourne Stars Women match could hence turn out to be a high-scoring game.

There has just been one international T20I match played at the Manuka Oval, Canberra - between Australia and Pakistan in November 2019. Australia had comfortably chased down Pakistan's total of 150. It does give an indication that the team winning the toss is likely to bowl first as the pitch should remain true throughout and will be good for chasing.