Stoinis breaks shackles after 'hard look' at himself

Marcus Stoinis looked out of sorts during his opening four matches of KFC BBL|12 and the Melbourne Stars allrounder has since admitted he didn't "play the right way" to start the tournament.

The Aussie middle-order blaster put a run of low scores behind him on New Year's Eve in Adelaide with a sensational 74 from just 35 deliveries to lead the Stars to their second win of the season.

Before that, he'd only reached double figures once in four innings and started his campaign with two ducks and a score of four.

Admittedly, he did suffer from a bout of Covid that prevented him from fielding in the Stars' opening two matches, but while the 33-year-old says he was a bit fatigued, that was no excuse.

"I was not happy with the way I've started, I tried to do a bit too much too soon and got caught up in wanting to hit a few boundaries," Stoinis admitted following his player-of-the-match performance against the Strikers.

"I just thought it was time to hit some hard balls along the ground and earn that right a little bit (to hit boundaries), so that was the plan.

"I probably got a bit carried away; I was a bit frustrated with Covid early on.

"Even though it's T20 and you want to bash it around, there's still a process to go by which I probably didn't respect for a while there.

"I was a bit fatigued but that's not an excuse.

"It's more that when you rock up you need to be on, and you need to respect the game and play the right way.

"And I wasn't really doing that, so sometimes it needs to happen just to have a good hard look at yourself and then go back to the processes that you know work."

Stoinis was on four off eight balls when he and Joe Clarke elected to take the Power Surge at the beginning of the 12th over on Saturday night, which the Aussie right-hander took Peter Siddle for 24 runs with five of the six deliveries going to the boundary.

He later launched the tournament's leading wicket-taker Henry Thornton into the Adelaide Oval stands four times in the one over, taking the 18th of the innings for 29 runs as 52 of his runs came from just 11 deliveries.

"The plan was to hit hard cricket shots, which rather than have five out and try to clear the boundary, it's probably a bit smarter to have most of the fielders in," he says.

"That got me going.

"The key now in the next game is to not go out and try and do exactly the same thing.

"Again, it's more about understanding the conditions again and going through that same process."

That next game is the Melbourne derby against crosstown rivals the Renegades tomorrow night at the MCG in what could be a season defining clash for both sides.

The Renegades have three wins in BBL|12 to the Stars two, but have dropped their last four on the trot, while the Stars are coming off a confidence boosting win over the Strikers and have won their only other match at the MCG so far this season.

"It's always a good game, everyone loves playing in it," said stand-in Renegades skipper Aaron Finch.

"A great battle in that one is the two Kiwi legends (Trent) Boult and (Martin) Guptill facing off at the top of the order.

"Obviously, Stoin (Stoinis) found some form … they started a bit slow but they've got so much power and so much experience in their side."

Stars squad v Renegades: Adam Zampa (c), Trent Boult (New Zealand), Hilton Cartwright, Joe Clarke (England), Brody Couch, Nathan Coulter-Nile, Liam Hatcher, Clint Hinchliffe, Campbell Kellaway, Nick Larkin, Tom O'Connell, Tom Rogers, James Seymour, Marcus Stoinis, Beau Webster, Luke Wood (England)

Renegades squad v Stars: Aaron Finch (c), Jake Fraser-McGurk, Martin Guptill (New Zealand), Sam Harper, Mackenzie Harvey, Akeal Hosein (West Indies), Shaun Marsh, David Moody, Jack Prestwidge, Kane Richardson, Corey Rocchiccioli, Tom Rogers, Will Sutherland, Mujeeb Ur Rahman (Afghanistan), Jon Wells