Khawaja blows open Sandpapergate, claims entire Australia team was involved

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

The scandal broke during the third Test at Newlands in March 2018, when television cameras caught Bancroft using a piece of sandpaper to rough up the ball in an attempt to generate reverse swing. Cricket Australia's investigation found that David Warner had come up with the plan, Bancroft had carried it out and then 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 handed a lifetime ban from leadership roles in Australian cricket, which was overturned in 2024.

Speaking to Nine newspapers ahead of the release of his autobiography Sabr on Tuesday, November 10, Khawaja offered a very different account of what happened. He claimed the practice had started during the second Test in Port Elizabeth and questioned why Cricket Australia's investigators never spoke to him, despite him sitting next to Bancroft during the Cape Town Test.

"It was all of us. Not the batters, not the bowlers, not the staff. All of us," Khawaja told Nine.

"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," he said, explaining why he had decided to speak up.

Khawaja said he had always felt the responsibility should have been shared by the team rather than left with three players. He recalled telling his teammates in the dressing room to take collective responsibility after the incident, but said that was not how things unfolded. He also spoke about the toll the scandal had taken on Smith, Warner and Bancroft, who, in his view, continued to carry the weight of what happened.KHAWAJA QUESTIONS CA INVESTIGATION

Khawaja has also questioned why he was never asked to give his account during Cricket Australia's investigation. The inquiry was conducted by then head of integrity Iain Roy and team performance manager Pat Howard, following instructions from chief executive James Sutherland. It led to the suspensions of Smith, Warner and Bancroft.

"I was sitting next to Cam Bancroft that whole Test match, and I didn't get interviewed," Khawaja said. He added that he had waited for investigators to contact him, but never received a call before the punishments were announced.

Questions about how much the Australian bowlers knew had also surfaced in 2021. After Bancroft suggested that their awareness of the ball tampering was "self-explanatory", Pat Cummins, Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood and Nathan Lyon issued a joint statement denying that they knew a foreign substance had been taken onto the field to alter the ball.

Cricket Australia has stood by its investigation. Responding to Khawaja's latest comments, the governing body said it remained comfortable with the findings and that all relevant information presented to it had been properly considered.SOUTH AFRICA'S ROLE IN THE DEBATE

Khawaja also claimed South Africa were better at working on the ball to generate reverse swing and that Australia were trying to keep up with them. He said his autobiography would reveal more about what he had heard regarding the hosts' methods. Former South Africa captain Faf du Plessis had himself been sanctioned twice for ball tampering, including during a Test against Australia.

Khawaja's claims have not altered the official findings of the 2018 investigation, but they have brought the controversy back into focus. Eight years on, his account raises fresh questions about what the Australian dressing room knew and whether Smith, Warner and Bancroft were left to take the blame for something that went beyond the three of them.- Ends