Australia’s Khawaja claims entire team knew about ‘Sandpapergate’

Usman Khawaja, the former Australian opener, has claimed that the entire Australian cricket team was aware of the controversial "Sandpapergate" scandal that took place during a 2018 Test match in Cape Town. According to Khawaja, not only the batters and bowlers, but also the team staff were aware of the ball-tampering plot. The incident ultimately led to the sacking of captain Steve Smith, who was found to be the only player with prior knowledge of the scheme, along with his deputy David Warner and Cameron Bancroft.

Both Smith and Warner faced a year-long ban, while Bancroft received a nine-month ban. However, former teammates such as Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood, and Nathan Lyon publicly denied having any knowledge of the scandal in 2021. Khawaja, who recently released his autobiography, expressed his belief that the truth about the matter should have been revealed earlier and questioned why it took this long for the truth to come out.

Darren Lehmann, the head coach at the time, denied that everyone in the team was aware of the plot, stating that ball-tampering was once a common practice in international cricket but is now obsolete and wrong.