David Warner has fired back at former Australia batting coach Graeme Hick after he branded Usman Khawaja’s claims about the Sandpapergate scandal ‘absolutely false’.
Warner also claimed Australian players offered to contribute part of their salaries to keep Michael Di Venuto as batting coach before Hick replaced him in 2016.
‘Let’s get the facts straight. Graeme Hick was only appointed because Cricket Australia was unwilling to pay Michael Di Venuto what he deserved,’ Warner wrote on X.
‘As players, we valued Michael so highly that we even offered to contribute from our own salaries to retain him.
‘These discussions were taking place during the New Zealand tour. That alone speaks volumes about how highly we regarded him and how determined we were to keep him involved. Adds to why Graeme has spoken!!’
Warner’s intervention came after Hick rejected Khawaja’s claim that responsibility for the 2018 ball-tampering scandal extended to the Australian team and coaching staff.
‘I have seen the various statements around the coaches, and I’m very disappointed with the broad nature of them,’ Hick told The Sydney Morning Herald.
‘Khawaja puts it simply: ‘It was all of us. Not the batters, not the bowlers, not the staff. All of us’. To me, what Khawaja is implying here is absolutely false.’
David Warner (pictured right with Usman Khawaja) has launched another attack as the Sandpapergate dispute continues to divide Australian cricket
Former Australian batting coach Graeme Hick (pictured right with Aussie batsman Travis Head) has strongly rejected Khawaja’s allegations
Warner claims Australian players offered to contribute from their salaries to retain Di Venuto
Hick also explicitly denied knowing about discussions concerning ball-tampering at either Port Elizabeth or Cape Town.
‘In regard to any discussions around the ball-tampering in Port Elizabeth or Cape Town, I will say in true honesty that I did not hear or know anything,’ he said.
‘My first knowledge of all this was, like many, when it appeared on the big screen in Cape Town as I was sat on the outside balcony at the time.’
Hick replaced Di Venuto as Australia’s batting coach in 2016, about two years before the Sandpapergate scandal.
Di Venuto had served in the role since 2013 after a playing career in which he scored 25,200 first-class runs and represented Australia in nine one-day internationals.
His time with the national side coincided with Steve Smith’s transformation into one of the world’s leading batters.
Australia also trusted Di Venuto to step in as head coach when Darren Lehmann was sidelined with deep vein thrombosis shortly before Di Venuto’s departure for Surrey.
Smith made clear how highly Di Venuto was regarded in a farewell message at the time.
Di Venuto enjoyed a prolific domestic playing career before moving into coaching
Steve Smith praised Michael Di Venuto in a glowing farewell message a decade ago
‘Thanks Michael Di Venuto for all that you have done for me the last couple of years,’ Smith wrote.
‘You’ve been an absolutely amazing Batting coach and a great man. You are going to be missed by myself and all of the Australian batters.
‘You are going to be a great head coach and Surrey are very lucky to have you.’
Di Venuto went on to deliver the success Smith predicted, guiding Surrey to the 2018 County Championship, the club’s first title in the competition for 16 years.
Smith’s tribute supports Warner’s claim that players valued Di Venuto, although it makes no mention of a salary dispute or an offer to help fund his retention.
Hick served as Australia’s batting coach from 2016 to 2020 and was part of the coaching setup when Cameron Bancroft was caught using sandpaper on the ball during the Cape Town Test.
Warner has firmly backed Khawaja’s version of events, declaring: ‘It’s 100 per cent accurate what you’ve said. Now everyone knows the truth.’
However, their account has been disputed by Hick, former head coach Darren Lehmann and fast bowler Mitchell Starc.
Warner has publicly backed Khawaja’s account of the Sandpapergate scandal
Join the discussion
Should more people be held accountable for Sandpapergate, or is blame being unfairly spread?
Former bowling coach David Saker previously said the blame may have been spread more widely in a 2021 interview.
‘Obviously, a lot of things went wrong at that time,’ he said.
‘The finger-pointing is going to go on and on, and on. There was a lot of people to blame. It could have been me to blame, it could have been someone else. It could have been stopped, and it wasn’t, which is unfortunate.
‘Cameron’s a very nice guy. He’s just doing it [the media interview] to get something off his chest … he’s not going to be the last. You could point your finger at me, you could point your finger at ‘Boof’ [Lehmann], could you point it at other people – of course you could.
‘The disappointing thing is it’s never going to go away, regardless of what’s said. We all know that we made a monumental mistake. The gravity wasn’t as plain until it all came out.’
The competing accounts have reopened the wounds of a scandal that resulted in 12-month bans for Warner and Smith and a nine-month suspension for Bancroft.
In his autobiography Sabr, Khawaja challenges Cricket Australia’s finding that only those three players had prior knowledge of the plan.
He has defended his decision to revisit the scandal while declining to publicly identify which individuals knew about it.
Cricket Australia has maintained its support for the original investigation and says it has no compelling reason to reopen it.
