‘Far more than 3 people involved’ – Old quotes from David Warner’s manager resurface amid CA row over Sandpapergate investigation originally appeared on Cricket News. Add Cricket News as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
KEY TAKEAWAYS:
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Old remarks from David Warner’s manager are back in focus amid the ongoing Sandpapergate row.
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He once claimed the plan began in a dressing room after a heavy defeat.
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His words arrive just as Cricket Australia faces fresh questions over its 2018 investigation.
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‘They were told to do it’: David Warner’s manager’s explosive 2022 claims on Cricket Australia resurface amid Sandpapergate fallout
Far more than three people were involved in the 2018 ball-tampering plan, according to James Erskine, and his words from a few years ago have found their way back into the middle of a heated debate. They have done so at a moment when Australian cricket is again being forced to explain what happened in South Africa.
Erskine, who manages David Warner, made the claims in 2022, but they are being widely shared again because of Warner’s latest accusations against Cricket Australia. On Saturday, the former opener said that, as far as he knew, the board had never interviewed Josh Hazlewood, Mitchell Starc or Nathan Lyon during its original probe, and he said the whole thing “stinks of a cover up”.
That statement followed a tense Friday in which captain Pat Cummins rejected any suggestion that he had prior knowledge of the plan. Cricket Australia insists every player was given the chance to speak at the time, and chief executive Todd Greenberg has already ruled out a new investigation, yet the controversy shows no sign of fading.
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It is against that backdrop that Erskine’s comments make for interesting reading, because they suggest the roots of the scandal went back to an earlier Test match and that the group involved was far bigger than the three players who were punished.
Steve Smith / David Warner
(Getty Images)
James Erskine’s 2022 claim: Australia were told to tamper with the ball after the Hobart Test loss to South Africa
Erskine alleged that Australia were given the green light to tamper with the ball after their defeat against South Africa in Hobart during the 2016-17 season. In that match, Australia were bowled out for 85 and lost by an innings and 80 runs, with the contest wrapped up in little more than two days.
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South Africa’s captain at the time, Faf du Plessis, was also found guilty of ball tampering after he was seen applying saliva to the ball while holding a mint in his mouth. Erskine’s version of what followed in the Australian dressing room, however, was much more serious in its implications.
He told SEN radio about the scene after the defeat, describing a group of senior officials who were unhappy with the result and who were not shy about saying so.
“Two senior executives were in the changing room in Hobart, and basically were berating the team for losing against South Africa,” Erskine told SEN radio back in 2022. “And Warner said we’ve got to reverse swing the ball, and the only way we can reverse swing the ball is basically by tampering with it. So they were told to do it.”
It is worth noting that Erskine never said who had actually “told” the players to tamper with the ball. He also did not name the two executives he said were present after the loss.
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MORE: Akram questions Australian bowlers’ ‘didn’t know’ defence in Sandpapergate
‘Far more than three people involved’: Erskine on the Sandpapergate punishments and Warner’s leadership ban appeal
The comments came after Warner issued a statement saying he was withdrawing his appeal against the lifetime leadership ban handed to him after the 2018 Newlands controversy. Erskine used the moment to repeat his earlier view that more than three people had to know about the plans, and he added that the “truth will come out”.
His main complaint was about fairness. In his opinion, Warner had been treated much more harshly than others, and Cricket Australia should have dealt with the leadership ban internally instead of sending it to a review panel that then decided it wanted to look at the entire incident again.
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“You’d have to be a blind black Labrador to not realise there was far more than three people involved in this thing. They all got a canning, and David Warner was completely villainised,” he said.
“He has shut up, he protected Cricket Australia, he protected his fellow players on my advice, because at the end of the day no one wanted to hear any more of it, and he’s got on playing cricket.”
He then turned his attention to the appeal process, arguing that the board could have solved the problem sensibly and quickly. For him, the sight of a player going through such a battle just to seek a review was hard to defend.
He added: “Why Cricket Australia couldn’t have done a very sensible thing and said ‘Listen, it’s not legal that someone doesn’t have a right of appeal’. It’s just absurd; why should he have to go through that? He has done everything he possibly could for Cricket Australia and for his team, and now he’s being treated like this… this is injustice at its greatest level.”
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MORE: Cummins’ wife shows support after media interaction on ‘Sandpapergate’
Usman Khawaja / David Warner
(Getty Images)
Erskine on respect, Warner’s future and Cricket Australia’s relationship with its players
Erskine also spoke about the long term, pointing out that Warner, then 35, still had a few years of working life ahead of him. For a sportsman who had given everything to Australian cricket, he said, respect was the thing that mattered most, and it came from doing the right thing.
He accepted that the players had not done the right thing, but he believed public opinion would change once the full story was known.
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“Well, look, the thing about this is that David Warner has basically, whatever, he’s 35 years old, he’s got another 30 years of working. And the one thing you want when you’ve been a major sportsman and given a lot of enjoyment to a lot of people, you want respect,” he said.
“You get respect by doing the right thing. And David Warner, sure, they didn’t do the right thing. But when the truth comes out, everyone’s going to turn around and say, ‘Well, why was David Warner picked upon?'”
Erskine then criticised the board, saying it had made the situation harder than it needed to be and had refused to take a firm position.
“I just think that Cricket Australia have made it so difficult. And, you know, they’ve been sitting on the fence; they’ll have splinters in their a***. I mean, they have to have a symbiotic relationship in the future with their players. This master-slave relationship is just bloody bollocks.”
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MORE:Sandpaper took it to ‘next level’: ABD admits all teams tried to produce reverse swing
‘The truth will come out’: What Erskine said about how the Sandpapergate story could unfold
The interviewer asked a fair question at this point, wondering how the truth could possibly come out if Warner chose not to write a book. Erskine had a quick answer, and it involved other members of the squad rather than his client.
He said: “Oh, the truth will come out. I mean, there’s lots of people. You know, there’s two cricketers who said at the time, put their hands up and said, ‘Why don’t we all just tell the truth? They can’t fire all of us.’ You know?”
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The conversation moved on to the du Plessis incident, with the host recalling that the South African captain had been sanctioned after his side won the Test. Erskine said he was firmly against tampering, but he felt the sport had a long history of it and that the penalty at that time was only a one-match ban from the ICC.
“I’m completely against it. I think tampering with balls is a joke, but it’s gone on for centuries; Atherton bit it, you know, everybody’s been fiddling around with balls. And the penalty at the time by the ICC was a one-match ban,” he said.
“Now, I’m not suggesting that’s right, because I don’t think you should tamper with the ball. I mean, no one would tamper with a ball in golf. If they’ve done it in the NFL, where they let the ball down and stuff like that. But this was blown out of all proportion, partly because of the Prime Minister, but partly the total reaction of the general public.”
He ended by saying he agreed it had not been a good thing, yet he felt the response had gone too far. In his view, the outcome was one-sided and hard to justify.
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He said: “I totally agree that it wasn’t something that was good. But it’s gone to the stage where three people have been completely victimized by everybody else, and it’s not fair.”
MORE: ‘Tried eradicating it’: Cummins admits Australia of 2018 had a ‘win at all costs’ mentality
Erskine’s old Sandpapergate claims add fuel to the current Sandpapergate row
Erskine’s comments need to be treated with care, since he represents Warner and has an obvious interest in how the story is told. He also named nobody, which makes his claims about the Hobart dressing room impossible to test. Allegations without names are easy to make and very hard to prove.
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Even so, the timing makes them hard to ignore. Warner is now saying the bowlers were never interviewed in 2018, and Erskine said years ago that far more than three people knew what was going on. Taken together, the two claims point in the same direction, and they put the same uncomfortable question in front of Cricket Australia: how thorough was its original inquiry?
The board’s answer so far is that everyone had the opportunity to speak and that nobody has come forward with fresh evidence. That is a fair point, but it doesn’t settle matters for fans who remember how heavily three players were punished while others walked away.
Erskine’s remark about the board needing a better relationship with its players might be the most useful part of it all. If trust had been stronger in 2018 and the years after, perhaps the argument wouldn’t still be running in 2026. Cricket Australia can choose to keep saying the matter is closed, but old quotes like these show it won’t be closed until people feel the full story has been heard.
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