Former Australia head coach Darren Lehmann has denied the claims of Usman Khawaja that the entire team was aware of the infamous Sandpapergate scandal during the 2018 Test series against South Africa, saying he was unaware of the discussions and that responsibility may have varied from player to player.
“No, no,” Lehmann told ABC when asked whether he knew about the conversations surrounding the incident.
“Again, there’s conversations going on everywhere about lots of things in the game of cricket. That would be one for Smith and Khawaja to discuss. But for me, when you’re in conversation about the game of cricket itself, you know reverse swing is happening. So it certainly was talked about how we’re going to combat reverse swing. Because they were doing it very well, South Africa, and making the ball swing.”
Lehmann’s comments came after Khawaja questioned the long-standing account of the scandal, which saw Steven Smith, David Warner and Cameron Bancroft identified as the main people responsible.
Speaking to Nine, Khawaja said the entire Australian team had been involved in the episode.
“It was all of us. Not the batters, not the bowlers, not the staff. All of us. In an ideal world, I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to be the one who comes out and talks about the truth. The issue is that I genuinely thought after eight years the truth would have been out by now,” Khawaja said.
Lehmann, who was Australia’s head coach during the 2018 tour, said he could not speak for the other players and suggested that knowledge of the ball-tampering may not have been universal.
“I don’t think everyone would have known,” Lehmann told ABC. “But you do know ball-tampering is going on because it’s been happening for 150 years. So it’s just how it’s being done and how you would know to that extent, I suppose, and how the bowlers would know, how other players would know.
“So that’s an individual case-by-case… on the players, and I suppose they’ll respond with their thoughts and what they know. I can’t speak for them at all. I can only know what I know, and I know that ball-tampering was a big part of the game of cricket. Now it’s obsolete. But that doesn’t make it right either, but that’s the case, and we paid a heavy price for that.”
Former Australia fast bowler Jason Gillespie also reacted to the claims, calling Khawaja’s account ‘fascinating’.
“Usman claims that he went and addressed the whole team and said, ‘We need to take collective responsibility for this.’ He said everyone was in that room. So, I found that really fascinating,” Gillespie said in a video posted by ABC Sports on X.
Lehmann, meanwhile, also questioned the timing of Khawaja’s revelations, suggesting that the publication of the latter’s account could be linked to his book.
“That’s part and parcel of selling books, I suppose. I don’t know what he’s getting paid. He’s probably getting paid a lot of money to do it. Is it worth it? I don’t know. Maybe I’ll write a book. Things are left unsaid sometimes for the good of the game and the good of the people. But it is what it is. You’ve just got to deal with it, don’t you? Each time it comes up. It’ll happen somewhere else, I’m sure.”
Lehmann said he had not spoken to Khawaja about the claims, adding that the Sandpapergate episode does bring back difficult memories.
“It’s not easy to talk about even now, and then you go back there, and I don’t know any way else to say this, but it puts you back in a bad place. So hopefully I can just get through this, and we move forward again,” he said.
Smith and Warner were handed 12-month suspensions from international and domestic cricket after the scandal, while Bancroft was sanctioned for nine months. Lehmann, despite being cleared of his involvement in the scandal, resigned as head coach after the tour and also apologised for Australia’s actions.
