Smith warns SA against sledging

MUMBAI: Steve Smith has warned the South Africa against sledging him ahead of Australia’s fourtest series beginning in Durban on Thursday.

The Australian cricket team skipper, who is coming off an impressive Ashes series where he scored 687 runs with the help of three hundreds to lead his team to a 4-0 win in the five-match series, said the South Africans can sledge him at their own peril.

“They can go for their lives,” he was quoted as saying by cricket.com.au.

In the Ashes series, after Smith scored a match-winning hundred in the first Test at Brisbane, England had tried to get under his skin during the second Test at Adelaide.

Though Smith could score only 40 and six in Adelaide, Australia went on to win the match by 120 runs.

Smith then bounced back in style in the third Test, hitting the career-best 239 to fashion seriesclinching win for his team.

The 29-year-old now believes that another round of sledging in South Africa will only motivate him to produce his best.

“I might be able to tell you more after the first Test match, but if they do, go for it, it doesn’t bother me. A bit of a verbal challenge actually makes me switch on a bit more and gets me in for the fight,” he said.

Smith named the same playing XI for the first Test that he had used against England in the last Ashes Test at Sydney in January.

Though he was not sure about the behaviour of the pitch for the first Test, he believes that the current players are good enough to deal with all conditions.

Australia playing XI: David Warner, Cameron Bancroft, Usman Khawaja, Steve Smith (c), Shaun Marsh, Mitchell Marsh, Tim Paine (wk), Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, Nathan Lyon, Josh Hazlewood.