Rubber composition for use in a tread of a pneumatic tire

A rubber composition for use in a tire tread and a respective tread and pneumatic tire with such a tread is dieclosed. The rubber composition comprises from 20 to 90 part by weight per 100 parts by weight of rubber (phr) of a solution polymerized styrenebutadiene rubber; from 10 to 80 phr of a polybutadiene rubber, wherein from 0 to 20 weight percent of the polybutadiene rubber is a syndiotactic polybutadiene rubber comprising at least 70 percent of monomeric units in syndiotactic 1,2 configuration and the balance of the polybutadiene rubber comprises at least 90 percent of monomeric units in cis-1,4 configuration; and from 50 to 150 phr of pre-hydrophobated silica, preferably precipitated silica, wherein the pre-hydrophobated silica is hydrophobated prior to its addition to the rubber composition by treatment with at least one silane selected from the group consisting of alkylsilanes, alkoxysilanes, organoalkoxysilyl polysulfides and organomercaptoalkoxysilanes.