If you’re a Heat fan, this headline is the type of headline that makes your coffee taste even better: Marnus Labuschagne is back in teal for BBL 15, getting ready for a 10th season. Availability rests on Ashes selection, but his intentions are clear – he wants in, at every possible turn. That blend of loyalty to the Heat and timing of that loyalty is important in a league where associations rarely last for more than one season, yet timelines and momentum are everything.
The glue Brisbane didn’t know they missed
Marnus isn’t a typical T20 cliché of a slam-and-tonker; he sets your tempo in a game and safely turns awkward powerplays into chaseable totals. His nothing-to-sneeze-at Big Bash cameos have been sneaky-impactful, and have included 73 off 48 in the BBL 12 Eliminator, 45 off 33 in the title run, and a career-high 77 off 44 last summer. Plus, he chucks in some handy leggies and some sticky hands at short cover, and you’ve got a three-players-in-one cricketer that just lifts the base level. If you put him in around Usman Khawaja and Colin Munro, and let Michael Neser and Spencer Johnson take the new ball and the death, Brisbane looks less boom-or-bust and more like they’re saying ‘we’ve got a plan’.
Ashes calendar math: how much Marnus can Heat get?
Find the dates. The NRMA Insurance Men’s Ashes starts in Perth on November 21 and runs into early January, and BBL 15 will start on December 14 and wrap on January 25. If Marnus plays all five Tests, the Heat could still potentially use him for a maximum of three games after the urn business is taken care of, which is the exact area contenders base late-season plans around. With an eye on total domination, Brisbane snatched Shaheen Shah Afridi at number one, planning for him to rattle the top order early and finish matches with a thunderbolt of pace while also leaning on their batting depth to survive the early churn. It’s clever list management: Put the pressure on first, and then bring Marnus’s middle-overs control into the picture as the competition gets tighter.
Shaheen + Marnus: chaos up top, control in the middle
There is a distinct atmosphere surrounding Afridi, with a new one emerging at the Gabba. By holding back just long enough, he coaxes early mistakes, and his angled lifts can make even poor contacts look like deliberate setups for fielders. Add Marnus’s middle-overs game – find the gaps, sprint hard twos, target length – Brisbane is covering both ends of T20 volatility. One applies the pressure while the other renders it – all while liberating Labuschagne to mentor younger players ( read Lachlan Hearne and Hugh Weibgen) and Kwaja to float off match-ups. By the time knockout goes around, a settled middle order and wicket-taking trajectory is literally how you turn hometown crowds into life positives.
Tickets for the general public will go on sale at 12pm AEST on August 19, and the Gabba should hum for one reason: the Heat have created a team that can start fast and finish even quicker when the Test boys arrive. Whether Marnus gets a two-to-three game cameo or a mini stretch run, he refines the batting plans, sharpens the fielding energy, and increases the tactical discussion during huddles. The decision is yours, Heat fans: Afridi fireworks into a Labuschagne-led chase, or Marnus arriving post-Ashes to lock down the top spot and trigger another banner run?
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