Daniel Sams’ availability was the big news ahead of Sunday’s Knockout match between the Sydney Thunder and Brisbane Heat with both sides naming their squads with no surprises among them.

SQUAD NEWS

The Sydney Thunder added Daniel Sams ($205k BAT/BWL) to their 19-man squad to play the Brisbane Heat in Sunday’s knockout in Canberra.

Sams has been cleared to play after missing the past three matches after a bone and tendon injury in his right hand.

Thunder coach Shane Bond said: “Dan is good to go, which is exciting for us. He trained fully yesterday and looked good, so he’ll come back into our team.

“His batting was the main thing we looked at. There’s always a couple of risks that are associated with an injured hand, so the main concern was his batting. The good news is he had no problems and is ready to go.”

Whether or not Sams’ batting will be impacted remains to be seen with the all-rounder saying: “That was the doctor’s orders.

“But he also said along with that if I had some strength and movement at training after that little bit of a break that I’d be good to go. Training has gone pretty well so far, so good to go for tomorrow’s game.

“All the stuff that I needed to yesterday, I was able to tick it off without any problems really. We’re actually a little bit surprised with how good it’s turned out.

“There’s a little bit of awareness of pain but I’ll be able to go out there and bat as I usually would.”

Thunder squad: Ferguson, Billings, Cook, Cutting, Davies, Doggett, Gilkes, Green, Hales, Holt, Khawaja, McAndrew, Milne, Nair, Ross, Sams, J. Sangha, T. Sangha, Tremain

The Heat named an unchanged 18-man squad for the game with no surprises.

Heat squad: Bartlett, Bazley, Burns, Bryant, Cooper, Denly, Gregory, Heazlett, Kuhnemann, Labuschagne, Laughlin, Lynn, Morkel, Pfeffer, Peirson, Steketee, Swepson, Wildermuth

VIDEOS

SUNDAY

The Thunder-Heat game will take place, while next after that is Thursday’s Challenger in Perth.