David Warner on Sandpapergate: Australian cricket's biggest controversy, the 2018 ball tampering scandal, has flared up once again. After the revelations made in Usman Khawaja's autobiography Sabr and Test captain Pat Cummins' marathon press conference, now former opener David Warner has directly put Cricket Australia in the dock. Making serious allegations against the board of cover-up in the 2018 investigation, Warner said that the board had already decided who would be made the scapegoat. Sharing a post on social media platform Instagram on Saturday, Warner claimed that in the investigation conducted after the Cape Town Test, Cricket Australia had not interrogated key bowlers Josh Hazlewood, Mitchell Starc and Nathan Lyon.
David Warner made serious allegations
David Warner, who faced a one-year ban after the 2018 Cape Town Test controversy, raised sharp questions on the fairness of the board's investigation process. In his Instagram post, he wrote, 'As far as I am aware, Cricket Australia did not interview Josh Hazlewood, Mitchell Starc or Nathan Lyon in its 2018 investigation. If this is true, then how can Australian cricket insist that the bowlers had no knowledge of this?'
David Warner further wrote, 'It seems that they had decided from the beginning on whom to blame, conducted a poor investigation to fulfill their purpose and now they want to maintain the false narrative that the bowlers were unaware. This completely smacks of cover-up.
Warner also angry at Pat Cummins
Warner's attack comes just a day after Test captain Pat Cummins' press conference in Sydney on Friday, where Cummins termed the allegations in Khawaja's book as 100% false and nonsense that the entire team was aware of the use of sandpaper. Expressing displeasure over Cummins' statement on Friday afternoon itself, Warner had said that he felt that the captain had left Usman Khawaja alone in the middle today.