Melbourne Renegades are hopeful Monday night's must-win match against Adelaide is the platform for Chris Gayle to transform what has been a decent on-field contribution from him into a dominant one.
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The Renegades' charmed run of rivals' results going their way since they last played a week ago ended on Saturday night as Sydney Thunder won heftily and Perth were relegated to third position by Melbourne Stars' stifling bowling performance.
Those results have meant a win alone is not enough for the Renegades to qualify for the semi-finals. To tip the Thunder out of the top four they need to win by at least 38 runs or, if they chase, within 16 overs.
"To be fair, all the results went our way until Saturday night ... that flipped it all around," coach David Saker said.
Saker said the need for them to win big against the top-placed Strikers would not affect the thinking of acting-captain Cameron White should he win the toss for the match at Etihad Stadium.
"We'd probably rather chase anyway, but it doesn't particularly matter. We'll go out and play normally and if the position comes up that we need to go a bit harder at certain times then we'll try to attack a bit more. But the first thing on our mind is to just try and win the game," he said.
"We need our best players, especially Chris [Gayle], contributing quite big. Having lost [Aaron] Finch and [Matthew] Wade we need big contributions from them.
"Whitey [Cameron White] and Dwayne Bravo were brilliant in the last game. Hopefully if it's not Chris it's someone else."
Saker said he had braced for not being able to call upon James Pattinson, and therefore had planned to rely on their existing pace attack of Chris Tremain, Nate Rimmington, Cameron Gannon and all-rounder Bravo.
"We've hung in there. In the last game [against the Thunder], those last four or five overs were as good as any in the tournament. That was really pleasing, and they can take some confidence into this game from that," he said. "We've known all along it probably was our weaker link, bowling. But we're getting better, which is great."
The Renegades' only change to their squad is recalling spinner Nathan Hauritz for reserve batsman Aaron Ayre. The Strikers, still missing Sri Lankan Mahela Jayawardene due to injury, named an unchanged squad.
Saker doubted Adelaide's mighty position - they cannot lose top spot - would have a significant bearing on the match.
"They'll be out to win the game. As professional sportsmen they'll be going out to do the best they possibly can," he said. "They might tinker with their batting order knowing that some of their batters haven't had a hit, but they'll still be a very tough team to beat."
Saker said he was eager to secure a first home win of the season at Etihad Stadium - "and if it's a good-enough home win we progress to the finals".
RENEGADES (from): Cameron White (c), Tom Beaton, Dwayne Bravo, Tom Cooper, Xavier Doherty, Cameron Gannon, Chris Gayle, Nathan Hauritz, Ben McDermott, Peter Nevill, Nate Rimmington, Cameron Stevenson, Chris Tremain.
STRIKERS (from): Brad Hodge (c), Jono Dean, Travis Head, Jon Holland, Hamish Kingston, Ben Laughlin, Jake Lehmann, Tim Ludemann, Michael Neser, Adil Rashid, Alex Ross, Kelvin Smith, Greg West.
