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Sam Billings has had games called off, a tour abandoned and hotel quarantine since his last cricket but he insists he's ready to go for the Sydney Thunder.

Sam Billings insists he will be ready to fire straight away for the Sydney Thunder after one of the most frustrating months of his cricket career.

The hard-hitting Englishman only emerged from hotel quarantine in Brisbane on Christmas Day after touching down in Australia earlier this month.

He has since trained in Canberra in the lead-up to the BBL clash with the Melbourne Stars on Tuesday night, getting in limited net sessions after not hitting for two weeks.

Before that he found himself on England's abandoned tour of South Africa, where two games were postponed before the one-day series was eventually called off.

"I was there for a while and didn't really play a game. It was just a bit weird," Billings told AAP.

"We obviously all wanted to play cricket. The situation unravelled as we all saw it did.

"When you get yourself into game mode and get your mind right, then you turn up to the ground to play cricket and the bus turns around, it's a bit unexpected.

"I've had a good few days down here with practice and just to get going. I will come in and be as ready as you can be."

Billings is one of the competition's biggest names, striking at above 130 in his previous seasons with the Sixers and scoring 118 from 110 balls in an ODI against Australia earlier this year.

There was a thought at one stage amid the drama that the English players would opt out of the BBL.

After having spent time in lockdown in South Africa due to what were ultimately false positives, two more weeks in hard quarantine hardly looked appealing.

Sixers quick Tom Curran was one of those players to withdraw, while fellow Englishman Tom Banton also made the move despite not being in South Africa.

But Billings said he'd never considered that, with no opposition from his partner at home.

"For me, no (it wasn't a thought)," he said.

"I had a pretty dark year last year with injury and missing the World Cup and not playing a lot of cricket,

"This summer, ironically, the cricket we had has been my best summer I have had. So I wanted to make up for a bit of lost time.

"It's totally individual and it's completely understandable for anyone."