As the festive season approaches, most punters thoughts turn towards the jam-packed football fixture list. But on the other side of the world, our antipodean cricketing friends are gearing up for the fourth edition of the ‘Big Bash League’.

The Australian franchise T20 cricket league has grown every year since it’s inception and this year’s edition looks to be it’s biggest and most exciting yet. For English fans, there is huge interest this year as both Kevin Pietersen and Freddie Flintoff line up in the competition. KP is turning out for the Melbourne Stars while Flintoff will be representing the Brisbane Heat.

Despite the IPL being viewed as the premier T20 competition, recent corruption scandals have somewhat tainted the competition. Meaning that the Big Bash is poised to become the best T20 league on the planet. It’s scheduling over Christmas does mean the tournament is shorn of it’s best Australian players as they take on India in the Test series, but many of the world’s biggest T20 stars have all gathered down under for BBL04. As well as KP and Flintoff, Luke Wright will stake to the field for the Melbourne Stars and new ODI skipper Eoin Morgan is pencilled into the Sydney Thunder line up alongside Jacques Kallis.

The tournament is growing every year and has pioneered many new innovations in the game including the flashing bails and many new on-screen features from Channel 10. The way the Big Bash has been marketed can be a lesson to the ECB; without ruining the tradition of domestic cricket, Cricket Australia have managed to introduce an exciting, profitable and innovative tournament.

With such an array of talent on show and a large English contingent, this year’s Big Bash is set to be the best yet. One of the biggest questions is how will Pietersen fare on his return to Australia after a horror show in the Ashes debacle last winter. I for one think the Pietersen may just prove a point during this tournament and could dismantle a few attacks over the coming weeks. You could do a lot worse than get on Pietersen as top batsman in the tournament and also back him to be top scorer in each of the matches he plays.

In terms of the outright winner, I think that it’s pretty wide open. The stars have a lot of big names but can they gel as a team? The Hurricanes are exactly the opposite, often putting in performances better than the sum of their parts. I would look at backing them to win BBL04 – they’re 5/1 on most sites. After a terrible losing run over the past few years, little is expected of the much ridiculed Sydney Thunder, but with the acquisition of both Morgan and Kallis, their side looks much stronger in this edition and a run to the knockout stages cannot be ruled out.

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