Usman Khawaja opens up on Sandpapergate, claims the entire Australian team was involved

Usman Khawaja has reopened one of Australian cricket’s darkest chapters, claiming the entire team knew about and was involved in ball-tampering during the 2018 tour of South Africa. The former Australian batsman also claimed sandpaper was used on the ball in the previous Test at Port Elizabeth, now Gqeberha, before Cameron Bancroft caught it on camera in Cape Town.

The scandal erupted during the third Test at Newlands in March 2018 when television cameras caught Bancroft using a piece of sandpaper to roughen the ball in an attempt to create a backswing. A Cricket Australia investigation found David Warner came up with the plan, Bancroft carried it out and captain Steve Smith knew about it but failed to stop it. All three were sent home from the tour. Smith and Warner received 12-month bans from international and domestic cricket, while Bancroft was suspended for nine months. Warner was also banned for life from senior roles in Australian cricket, which was lifted in 2024.

In an interview with Nine newspaper ahead of the release of his autobiography, Sabr, on Tuesday, November 10, Khawaja offered a very different account of what happened. He claimed the exercise began during the second Test in Port Elizabeth and questioned why Cricket Australia investigators never spoke to him despite sitting next to Bancroft during the Cape Town Test.

“It was all of us. Not the batsmen, not the bowlers, not the staff. All of us,” Khawaja told Nine.

“In an ideal world, I don’t want to do that. I don’t want to be the one to come out and talk about the truth. The problem is, I honestly thought that after eight years the truth would have come out,” he explained of why he decided to speak out.

Khawaja said he always felt that the responsibility should be shared by the team rather than leaving three players. He recalled telling his teammates in the locker room after the incident to take collective responsibility, but said that’s not how things turned out. He also spoke of the toll the scandal had taken on Smith, Warner and Bancroft, who he felt continued to bear the brunt of what happened.

KHAWAJA CA INVESTIGATION ISSUES

Khawaja also questioned why he was never asked to provide his account during Cricket Australia’s investigation. The investigation was carried out by then head of integrity Iain Roy and team performance manager Pat Howard under instructions from chief executive James Sutherland. This led to the suspension of Smith, Warner and Bancroft.

“I sat next to Cam Bancroft the whole Test match and I didn’t get an interview,” Khawaja said. He added that he waited for investigators to contact him, but they never heard back before the sentences were announced.

Questions about how much the Australian bowlers knew also arose in 2021. After Bancroft suggested their awareness of the ball-tampering was “self-evident”, Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood and Nathan Lyon issued a joint statement denying they knew a foreign substance had been applied to the pitch to alter the ball.

Cricket Australia stands by its investigation. In response to Khawaja’s latest comments, the governing body said it was satisfied with the findings and that all relevant information presented to it had been properly considered.

SOUTH AFRICA’S ROLE IN THE DISCUSSION

Khawaja also claimed that South Africa were better at working the ball to create reverse swing and that Australia struggled to keep up with them. He said his autobiography would reveal more about what he had heard about the hosts’ methods. Former South Africa captain Faf du Plessis himself was penalized twice for ball-tampering, including during the Test against Australia.

Khawaja’s claims did not change the official conclusions of the 2018 investigation, but they brought the controversy back into the spotlight. Eight years on, his account raises fresh questions about what the Australian dressing room knew and whether Smith, Warner and Bancroft were left to blame for something that went beyond the three of them.

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