Australia ball-tampering scandal

[meninblue]

Ball tampering bans should be lifetime.

For a moment let's imagine as per nicely worded comments by Broad are true. So Aussie bowlers got wickets with reverse due to tampering. England batters lost their wickets and the poor scores may impact their whole career. England selectors and fans think their batters are useless and then they make wide scale changes to team as well as selection. Tampering can have serious impact on careers and I would say like match fixing it deserves life ban for spoiling carreers of batsmen for no mistake of theirs.

Is Smith and Cameron and Lehmaan going to give career to SA batsmen if they have lost wicket to tampered ball and got out to lose place in squad. They should be banned forever for playing with others careers.

[Arthur Crabtree]

All those headlines about Smith rather than Bancroft.

[westoelad]

All those headlines about Smith rather than Bancroft.

Because it's a case of "Don't shoot the messenger".

[pompeymeowth]

This is the guy, for me, the chief architect of the awful culture now within the Aussie cricket team Borf.



An unbelievable Hypocrite, Racist and liar. The sooner the Aussies cut all links with him the better.

[andy]

Who will be next in the 'senior leadership' group to go? Lyon, Starc? where does the buck stop?

[Toby F]

I wont be following aus cricket for a while, at least until things become clearer, but things need to be kept in perspective.

You, and other Aussie's here, are talking about turning your back on the sport. So what perspective are you preaching? One that you are incapable subjectively of accomplishing?

I think you are well within your rights to turn your back away from the sport, but let's not add any asterisk about other people's OTT reactions. Your stance is about as tough as you can take

You've voted with your feet. So let's not pretend this is nothing.

I have always enjoyed following neutral matches, given I am in the US maybe I will have a closer look at the Windies and drop down for a match occasionally. I will certainly still follow cricket.

Ball tampering is more common than it should be, but it has mainly been isolated idiots. A plan from the senior players group puts it in a different perspective. The fact that they thought that this was in any way acceptable at all is an insult to their fans. There are individual Australian players I can support, but find it hard to support the team until it is clear who was involved. When I will support the team again depends a lot on CAs reaction.

[from_the_stands]

OK, so having had a day to take this all in, the ICC have already handed out their penalties, with CA currently carrying out their investigation. With the Australian media going into a frenzy over this, the general mood is that heads will roll. CA is really in a difficult position here - if they don't act in accordance with the expectation of the Australian public, the damage to the game could well be severe. One way or the other, the game here is going to take a massive hit.

Steve Smith - He's is deep brown stuff. His taking responsibility suggests that if the idea wasn't his (and it may well have been), then as captain, he approved it. Michael Vaughan is right. His position as Australian captain is now untenable. The board will relieve him of the armband, and his sponsors will abandon him. I suggested earlier in this thread that he receive a ban from all cricket for 12 months. Some folks are calling for a life ban, but that's ridiculous. Next year is the World Cup, followed by an away Ashes series. I tend to think that the board will suspend him for the Zimbabwe tour, and the home series against Bangladesh, and when his suspension ends, his next contract will be a lower tier contract.

David Warner - For some reason, I tend to think that the idea to cheat may have come from him. He's had a forgettable tour, and frankly, I think the board have had a gutful of his antics. If it comes to pass that this was Warner's idea, then his international career is as good as over. If it wasn't, but he's gone along with it anyway, he'll go for as long as Smith, losing his leadership status and returning on a lower tier contract. He might also find himself subject to a curfew whilst on tour.

Cameron Bancroft - Hmmm, he comes into the series under pressure to maintain his place, performs well, and then gets involved in this! I think the board will bin him for the Zimbabwe tour. I think he'll find this hard to live down. If he's in the Oz side for the next Ashes series, the Barmy Army will have him for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Darren Lehmann - According to Smith, the coaching staff had no knowledge of this. According to an article I read, when Lehmann saw that something was going on, he sent the 12th man straight out to put a stop to it. Lehmann certainly has his detractors, and for a variety of reasons. In this case, I think calls for his head maybe a bit misplaced. I guess the investigation will shine some light on that.

The leadership group - I'm not really sure who's in this, tbh. At a guess, I'd say; Lyon, Starc, and maybe Hazlewood and Khawaja. I couldn't really imagine Khawaja being involved in this. His discretions usually involve a failure to hand in homework. I'm not really sure about the others. They have protested their innocence. We'll have to wait and see.

The Zimbabwe tour isn't really a concern, or the home Tests to Bangladesh. The real test will be India at home. The Aussies will need to be on their very best behaviour, and the Indians are going to goad them like never before.

I still think that Mitchell Marsh is the best option as captain going forward. The armband did wonders for him at Western Australia. Maybe Khawaja for the vice captaincy, but he seriously needs to make runs. Reinstate Aaron Finch as T20 captain.

That'll do for now.

[sussexpob]

When I will support the team again depends a lot on CAs reaction.

How do you judge the right reaction? Not OTT but strong enough?

[bigfluffylemon]

Good post FTS.

This was the lead item on the ABC's current affairs program last night. Never mind Russian diplomatic expulsions, a looming trade war between the US and China, anti-gun rallies in the US, and the Australian government's attempts to push through a company tax cut which is the big local political story of the week. Nope - cricket scandal is number 1. Just goes to show what a big deal this is here.

There has been a lot of talk about the culture of the team generally, and how abusive the Aussies have been on the field. Warner's a clear leader in this, but it seems to have become a pervasive part of the team culture, and what makes it worse is the hypocrisy - as soon as the South Africans give as good as they get, the Aussies get all sanctimonious about how it's not on. No sympathy at all.

I daresay this will have died down by the summer, but at the moment I'm seriously rethinking my summer cricket-watching plans. Canberra's due to get its first test match, which is a big deal for cricket lovers here, and I was planning to attend and support Australia. Not sure if I want to now.

[mikesiva]

Toby and yuppie, I would like to urge you don't give up yet.

The latest reports are that warner and Bancroft may miss the final test. Lehmann may be replaced by Justin Langer.

Joe burns and George Bailey standing by?

[bigfluffylemon]

So many headlines flying around it's hard to know what to believe, but Smith is apparently looking at a long ban, Warner and Bancroft are out for the fourth test, Warner could be in big trouble, and Boof's apparently going to resign.

CA are set to make a final decision tomorrow morning SA time.

[Toby F]

When I will support the team again depends a lot on CAs reaction.

How do you judge the right reaction? Not OTT but strong enough?

How do you judge anything? A full and frank explanation would be a good start.

[Making_Splinters]

It's a difficult situation to see what an appropriate response from CA will be, I get the feeling there will be a very heavy handed resolution largely due to the public opinion back in Australia. The main differential here compared with previous cases of ball tampering is the fact that this was a pre-planned course of action by senior players rather than a spur of the moment decision by players on the field.

For me the most damning aspect for Smith and Warner was that the task was given to the most junior member of the side to complete, whether they were willing or not. That should in and of itself give both players a lengthy a ban in my opinion.

[GarlicJam]

To give an idea of how big an issue this is in Aus, I had a look at the ABC sports page earlier. I think that there were over 30 links to articles that were related to this incident.

30.

Admittedly a good number of those would be double ups, but it is a good indication of how seriously this is being viewed down here. And this is close on 3 days since it happened.

[GarlicJam]

It's a difficult situation to see what an appropriate response from CA will be, I get the feeling there will be a very heavy handed resolution largely due to the public opinion back in Australia. The main differential here compared with previous cases of ball tampering is the fact that this was a pre-planned course of action by senior players rather than a spur of the moment decision by players on the field.

For me the most damning aspect for Smith and Warner was that the task was given to the most junior member of the side to complete, whether they were willing or not. That should in and of itself give both players a lengthy a ban in my opinion.

I think an appropriate action/reaction will be sacking from the captaincy/vice captaincy for Smith/Warner, being dropped from the team, and having their central contracts torn up for all three.

Then, they need to go through the Sheffield Shield system to make their way back into the Aus side. Boof sacked. As to other members of the Leadership Group, this is pretty unclear.


As to the bit in bold, M_S, I am not so sure about that. Are you telling me that Atherton just happened to have dirt in his pocket, and then used it on the spur of the moment? Murray Mints have been a favourite for the one reason, haven't they? I think it no coincidence that the Seffer test trousers did not have zips in them before 2013, nor afterwards.

I think that there has been plenty of pre-meditated ball tampering going on in the past.

Afridi, now, he's a spur of the moment tamperer....

But I do agree, the Australian efforts were blatantly and overtly pre-meditated, clumsily done and callously executed/directed.


On top of that it was extremely stupid - they really should have known that they were going to get caught - and incredibly incompetent: they didn't even manage to alter the ball enough for the umps to consider changing it!