Australian cricket on the mend after torrid year

SYDNEY: Twelve months ago Australian cricket was in crisis, rocked to the core by a cheating scandal that left former captain Steve Smith and his deputy David Warner among the most vilified men in sport.

But against the odds it has turned a corner, with the shattered national team in form again and winning back fans under new coach Justin Langer after a clean out of the executive ranks. For the disgraced Smith and Warner, it has been a tumultuous and humbling year, marked by a torrent of vitriol, tearful apologies, community service and the slow process of winning back trust.

Friday will mark the end of their one-year bans from state and international cricket and they are set to be welcomed back with open arms. The “sandpapergate” scandal in Cape Town, which also saw rookie opener Cameron Bancroft exiled for nine months for attempting to alter the ball, triggered far-reaching consequences for Australian cricket.

Despite the progress, some pundits believe questions remain about the tampering issue. Mark Taylor, Ian Chappell and Ian Healy have all criticised the limited investigation by Cricket Australia. “There was no probe into finding out how long it (tampering) had been going on for,” Taylor, who was on the CA board at the time of the incident, told Channel Nine this week.

“There’s no doubt this ‘ball-management’ has been going on for a long time, and I dare say every country is either doing it or working out how to do it, but there’s a line somewhere between ball-management and ball-tampering.”