THE EDGE: The Edge previews The Hundred clash between Welsh Fire v Southern Brave Originals with a recommended BETDAQ bet.
Welsh Fire v Southern Brave
MATCH OVERVIEW:
The Hundred heads back to Cardiff on Monday as Welsh Fire host Southern Brave on Betdaq Betting Exchange. Welsh Fire come into this game after a much needed win against Trent Rockets on Saturday evening, once again their batting was poor outside of Bairstow but they were able to successfully defend 129/6. Trent Rockets threw away the game again in remarkable fashion. They were chasing 138/6 against Birmingham Phoenix earlier in the week and lost five wickets in the last 13 balls. Then against Welsh Fire they lost three wickets in the last seven balls.
The jury is definitely out on the Welsh Fire batting, and although they have two wins from four games now I don’t feel their win over Trent Rockets settles any debate. So far they’ve had to chase 86/8 from Manchester Originals who have been very poor, then they’ve scored 103/8, 94/9 and 129/6. The players are saying the scores at the Hundred are down to movement from having a logo on the ball; but there’s also an angle that the batting has just been poor as a whole. There’s certainly a big debate coming whether or not the quality of the tournament is good enough.
Southern Brave are sitting pretty though; after Saturday they sat top of the table with three wins from four games. It is worth mentioning though they have won against London Spirit, Manchester Originals and Birmingham Phoenix – those three sides sat in the bottom three spots while Southern Brave were top, so tougher challenges lie ahead for Brave!
WEATHER AND PITCH WATCH:
It’s fair to say that the first game here came as a surprise with a score of 113/9. Welsh Fire failed to chase that down too, losing by ten runs. We can see very slow and low wickets in Sophia Gardens from time-to-time, but scoring had been quite good at the T20 Blast here this summer. In the final Blast game of the season we saw a score of 243/4! We did see low scores here last year too however in the three full games; 87 all out (chased), 152/6 (won) and 109/9 (chased). I feel going into this game with anything bar an open mind on scoring would be a bad idea. We’ll have to judge the wicket when we see it.
RECOMMENDED BET:
It’s no surprise to see Southern Brave as the favourites here; they are top of the table at the time of writing after all. Welsh Fire have clearly had major issues with their batting – Bairstow came good with a 50 on Friday and they will need a lot more runs from him to be competitive. Southern Brave are trading 1.72, and I feel that offers good value. I really feel that once you can get Bairstow without him taking the game away, then that goes a long way to winning the game for Southern Brave. They are a much more solid side than Welsh Fire in every area.
The Edge Says:
Two points win Southern Brave to beat Welsh Fire at 1.72 on Betdaq Exchange
View the market here -> https://betdaq.biz/WelSth
IN-RUNNING STRATEGY:
As I have highlighted over the weekend, with players blaming the ball (or the logo on the ball) for low scores at the moment, it seems wise to really have a cautious approach when opening trades on any batting side at the moment. In terms of this game, I really want to be against the Welsh Fire batting outside of Bairstow – I’m happy to stay out of the market while he’s batting but I’m very keen to take on the Welsh Fire middle order. I feel that’s where we see most market movement.
