‘Complete and utter nonsense’: Pat Cummins doesn’t hold back in Sandpapergate riposte

Résumé détaillé

Test captain Pat Cummins has stepped into the ring to finish Usman Khawaja off with a KO uppercut in an extraordinary 70-minute press conference that will go down in Australian sporting legend.

After retired Test batsman Usman Khawaja threw the first powerful jab-cross in Sandpapergate Mark II with startling revelations in his book Sabr that Cape Town was a “one-in-all-in” ball tampering affair, Australian cricket was wobbly on its feet.

But just as it appeared Cricket Australia might throw in the towel, its Test captain Pat Cummins has stepped into the ring to finish Khawaja off with a KO uppercut.

In an extraordinary 70-minute press conference, a marathon by any standards in sport, held at Cricket Central at Sydney Olympic Park, Cummins was unequivocal in his responses to allegations Khawaja, landing blow after body blow on to his former teammate in front of a press pack of 30 reporters.

After informing reporters he would answer questions til there were no more to ask - “I don’t want to talk about this again after today, so even if it takes all day” - Cummins described Khawaja’s allegations the entire side was aware of ball tampering on their infamous tour of South Africa in 2018, as “complete and utter nonsense”.

“When he says ‘we all knew’, if by that he means that we knew sandpaper was going out on the field, he is 100 per cent wrong,” Cummins said.

“I’ve said that consistently for the last eight years. I did not know that was happening.

“But I think Usman actually says things that are actually far more serious than that. He says I and others were architects of a scheme to ball-tamper with sandpaper. That’s complete and utter nonsense.

“Some of these things are probably true, and they’re his (Khawaja’s) accounts of what happened, but I think there’s a few big leaps here, where he is being vague. I think the details really matter.

“Perhaps, there was conversations with Cam Bancroft about taking sandpaper out and how to do it. That doesn’t mean that everyone in that dressing room knew what was going on.”

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