There is a game before the game. And Steve Smith played that as well as he did while notching up his maiden IPL hundred against Gujarat Lions in Pune on Friday. Australian cricket’s golden-haired boy saw the batting surface and played out the innings in his mind before doing the actual legwork.

He is a keen thinker of the game. Whether it is building a partnership with Ajinkya Rahane or going upto MS Dhoni with suggestions during a crunch situation, Smith brings plenty to the table.

“MS Dhoni is open to my suggestions,” he quips when asked about his on-field discussions with the Rising Pune Supergiants’ skipper.

Excerpts from an exclusive interview with IPLT20.com:

A couple of injuries in your team have forced you to bat at No. 3. Isn’t that your natural batting position?

Yeah it’s a nice place to bat. Coming in during the powerplay makes things a little bit easy. (It is) Probably the best position to bat and it’s nice to sort of get in front of the strike rate and get the run rate up and going from there. Tonight it was nice to score a few runs but disappointed that we could not get over the line.

Where do you rate today’s hundred among your limited overs performances? Tell us about your innings today?

When I came out, I was quite positive. I was able to get a few boundaries early which always helps, eases the pressure a little bit and from there on, obviously with a little bit of luck after getting bowled of a no ball, and then kept going. I hit a few balls out there in the middle and was lucky enough to keep getting boundaries.195 was a pretty good score I thought, but we didn’t bowl and field as well as we would have liked to get us over the line.

How do you rate Ajinkya Rahane as a T20 opener? You have seen him both as an opponent and as a teammate.

I think he is a very good player, plays very good cricket shots, which is what you can do at the top. With someone at the other end who plays a bit harder, suits his style of play, Ajinkya can just sort of bat through the innings and build a few partnerships which is always crucial in this format of the game. He’s a class player and he is only going to continue to get better.

How are you as a team coping up with the barrage of injuries – KP and now Faf. We saw everyone raising their game today?

It is always difficult when you have these injuries. But the guys are doing their best to try and win some games. We haven’t started this tournament as well as we would have liked, but hopefully we can turn that around with a few wins in the next couple of games.

We have seen you and MS Dhoni having serious conversations on the field – first in Hyderabad and today while batting together? How open is he to suggestions?

We were basically just talking about the game, what we think can be used best at that time and I had a few ideas to share and if he wants to listen he can or he could just let it go. He did listen to a few ideas and implemented it which is nice. I think he’s pretty good with what he does, he works hard, he’s a very good captain, he listens to the people around him that have the experience as well, which is a good trait