Cape Town: South Africa’s Farhaan Behardien reckons that the batsmen will have to be smart with shot-selection since big hits won’t be easy to execute at the bigger Newlands in the series-deciding third T20I, here on Saturday.

India have never played T20 cricket at Newlands and South Africa don’t have a good record here either, but they are familiar with the conditions.

“In the Highveld (Centurion) the ball flies and can go for a six much more easily. Here, we have to be slightly smarter as the ball does not travel that far. Maybe we need to target a flatter trajectory. Maybe the twos become important. The Newlands pitch hasn’t changed much over the last two years. It is good. Some of the shots that go for six at Highveld can be caught at the boundary here,” Behardien said at the pre-match press conference.

“The last time we played here, we made 170 and Sri Lanka chased it down. We had a few dropped catches and the wind was a bit swirling. I reckon between 160 and 180 will be the ideal score. The ball might swing a bit.

“There could be some shape on offer… 160 would be a very competitive score depending we play two spinners or they play two spinners. Like I said, the ball here doesn’t travel as much as in Highveld. So one or two mishits here and you can pick up a couple of wickets, whereas in Johannesburg, with the kind of momentum, you can see the ball travel to boundary,” he explained.

Their confidence high after dominating the Indian spinners in the last match, Behardien is bullish about his side’s chances in the ‘virtual final’.

Behardien said they comprehend spin much better with an attacking mindset and will go all out to win.

“It is a big game. We learnt a lot from Johannesburg and we applied that in Centurion. As long as we keep improving, we will do better. We are playing against a strong outfit, but we have a plan. We had a good training session. We will be fighting tooth and nail to win on Saturday,” said Behardien.

“Our batsmen have a different mindset going into T20 cricket.”   

PTI