Cummins says the bowlers were interviewed in 2018, and Warner says Cricket Australia never asked three of them
David Warner has turned on Cricket Australia. In a statement on Saturday he said the board never interviewed Hazlewood, Starc or Lyon about Cape Town, and called its version of events a cover-up.
Nov 14, 2026
“As far as I am aware, CA did not interview Josh Hazlewood, Mitchell Starc or Nathan Lyon in their 2018 investigation,” Warner said. “If that’s correct, then how can CA push the idea that the bowlers didn’t know? It looks like they had decided who they wanted to blame from the very beginning, ran a shoddy investigation to serve the purpose and now they want to maintain the false narrative that the bowlers had no idea. That stinks of a cover-up.”
Cummins says the bowlers were the ones asked
Cummins is the fourth member of that Newlands attack, and he is not on Warner’s list. At a press conference he called himself in Sydney on Friday morning, which ran for more than an hour, the Australia captain said he was interviewed and that the bowlers were among the people specifically asked to take part. “I did my interview. I was totally truthful,” he said.
Starc said much the same on Tuesday. “We were heavily grilled through the process, at the time and since,” he told reporters. That moves the fight from who knew to whether three of Australia’s best-known bowlers were ever properly questioned, and Warner and Starc are giving opposite answers.
Cummins was blunt about the rest of Usman Khawaja’s memoir, Sabr, which says the whole team knew sandpaper was being used. He called that “100 per cent wrong” and “complete and utter nonsense”, and said he had been advised some of the claims were “probably defamatory”, though he will not sue. “There’s no grand plan. There’s no team meeting. There’s no bowlers saying this is what must happen,” he said. “Usman’s a friend, but friends aren’t casual with each other’s lives and reputations.”
Warner went after the captain first
Warner, working on Fox’s coverage of the ODI series against England, answered within hours. He said Cummins had thrown Khawaja “under the bus” and called the 2018 inquiry “a botched investigation”. Saturday’s statement turned that complaint away from the captain and onto the board.
Cricket Australia did not move. “All players were given the opportunity to speak at the time of the initial investigation and have had the ability to come forward with new evidence in the eight years since,” a spokesperson said. Chief executive Todd Greenberg had already said on 10 November that he saw no compelling reason to reopen the case.
Why this one will not go away
Smith and Warner were banned for a year in 2018 and Bancroft for nine months. Warner was also barred from leadership roles for life, a sanction an independent panel lifted in October 2024. CA’s finding that only those three knew about the plan has been the official record ever since, and Cummins, Starc, Hazlewood and Lyon denied any knowledge in a joint statement in 2021.
Warner has said the three of them accepted their punishment. What he disputes is an inquiry that stopped at their names. Khawaja has the backing of Warner and Chadd Sayers, a squad member on that tour. Darren Lehmann, his former assistant Graeme Hick and Starc have rejected his account.
On the field, Australia beat England by seven wickets in the first ODI in Perth on Friday with Cummins, Starc and Hazlewood all rested, as 21-year-old Mahli Beardman took 6 for 24 on debut. The second ODI is in Adelaide on Sunday, and the Cape Town questions will be waiting there too.