10.16 pm Heat had Thunder under some mild pressure with three wickets in the Powerplay, but Billings and Ross counter with an unbeaten century stand to get the Thunder over the line with plenty of breathing room to spare. Thunder bowlers were the ones who really set up victory by restricting Heat to a well below par total.

Alex Ross is the Player of the Match: "I've just been playing club cricket in Adelaide for my home club Kensington and then some games in New South Wales ahead of this Big Bash. It's always been nice to get up the order and the higher you can bat, the better. Our bowlers set up that win though. 140 was never enough on that wicket. A few of the guys talk about continuity in the team. There's no egos. To get two wins over Sixers in the warm-up matches was good."

Sydney Thunder stand-in captain Chris Green: "Fantastic start to our campaign. I thought we timed the chase really well and our bowlers set it up. [On Gurinder Sindhu] If we wind the clock back, he's worked really hard and put in a lot of performances. It's great to see him do really well tonight. The class and experience that Rossy and Billbo showed through the middle took pressure off us. It was a tough wicket to get started on but after 20-30 balls, they upped the tempo beautifully. [On Daniel Sams] He's hungry for success. He wants that opportunity and I want to try to provide it to him as much as possible."

Heat captain Jimmy Peirson: "Not enough runs tonight. The class of Billings and Ross took the heart out of our chances. We're looking forward to having some missing players come back. But there's still some good class in our side. It was a little tacky early but sped up to bat quite nicely at the back end of our innings and then in their innings. I'm still sort of learning my trade through this role of captaincy and keeping. I learned a lot tonight. Lynny is a wealth of experience and I'll be leaning on him quite a bit, Duckett as well with both of them playing cricket around the world."

That's it from us tonight. For Andrew McGlashan and the scoring team, I'm Peter Della Penna. Come back tomorrow for some more BBL when the Melbourne Renegades take on the Adelaide Strikers. Until then, take care!

Bartlett to bowl the 18th. Ross on strike to hit the winning run....