Farhaan Behardien recalls difficult times at the start of South Africa career

Former South African all-rounder Farhaan Behardien has opened up on the difficult times that he had to face early on in his international career. He played for the Proteas for six years between 2012 and 2018, having played 59 ODIs and 38 T20Is.

Referring to the earlier segments of his South Africa career, Behardien told IOL,

"I dealt with criticism poorly in the beginning. How I learned to deal with it was, I knew when I did badly, especially on the international stage."

He continued,

"I worked my a*** off to correct it, and I didn’t need anyone else telling me or to read it. Reading anything that got me down, when I was in the limelight, wasn’t worth it and once I let go of that, I enjoyed myself a little bit more."

Behardien's figures in the shortest format on both the domestic and international front are splendid, which also means that he was sent lower down the order with the expectation that he can pull a rabbit out of the hat. After all, he did average 36.6 and had a strike rate of 134.6 in the 175 T20s he played.

He does believe that situations where players are thrown into the thick of things might not have the best results, and the 36-year-old cited how difficult to play in a position such as that and the pressures that it comes along with it. He said,

"I’ve copped a lot of abuse, batting in the middle order trying to win games, trying to save games, if you don’t come off it’s a tough place to be. If you win it’s great, if you lose – the scales are so big."

The South African scored 1074 runs in the 59 ODIs he played for his country at an average of 30.7.