After a torrid week, Australia’s Test captain, Pat Cummins, promised he would answer every question thrown at him in one of the most eagerly anticipated press conferences in recent sporting memory.
And, over the course of 70 minutes at Cricket Central in Sydney, he did just that, covering a range of topics from sandpaper and ball tampering to Australian cricket culture and his friendship with Usman Khawaja, whose book Sabr, released on Tuesday, has caused ructions in the Australian cricket community.
“When he says we all knew – if by that he means we knew sandpaper was going out on the field – he’s 100% wrong,” Cummins said. “I said that consistently for the last eight years. I did not know that was happening.
“But I think Usman actually says things that are far more serious than that. He says that I and others were architects of a scheme to ball tamper with sandpaper. That’s complete and utter nonsense.”
“Usman is a friend, but friends aren’t casual with each other’s lives and reputations. In his book he’s been casual with my life and the lives of many others and, I think, Australian cricket. I support him to tell his story, 100%. I’m glad he feels like he can, but we have to be accountable for the things that we say and do.
“Usman is a friend. But I think the way he’s kind of been quite casual and flippant with people’s lives and the Australian cricket, I don’t think that’s OK. I don’t think that’s what friends do.
“It’s been eight and a half years, we have moved on. We’ll keep saying it, but again, these are people’s lives. It was traumatic for some of them. They have had to work through quite a bit to get out the other side. So, again, that’s why I’m really disappointed and frustrated this week … how it’s been dealt with so flippantly.”
“There was no masterplan around using illegal methods. I think that’s maybe something that hasn’t been spoken about enough. People assume you have gone from very legal methods to suddenly taking sandpaper and then [there] must have been some huge masterplan.
“The truth is that is not the case. There’s no grand plan. In a team meeting, there’s no bowlers saying, ‘This is what must happen.’”
“I have seen [ball tampering] once. Saw it in a Shield game, some time before the South African tour. Actually, one is a batter, a senior player. I won’t mention him. But he took a bottle cap out on to the field … I was looking going, ‘Wow, that’s not OK.’
“It was dealt with. The umpires knew it as well. They caught him out and said, ‘You got to stop that right now.’ It was dealt with. That’s the only time I had seen something illegal out there.”
“Let’s get into it. I had heard superglue. I’ve heard zippers. Superglue on the keeper’s gloves so you catch it. I had heard nail polish, layers and layers of nail polish. Murray Mints.
“These are discussions that I’m sure every suburban change room has as well. We are having them in the Australian cricket team but I think it’s one thing to talk about but another thing to go ahead and do it. Again, all of those methods I pointed out, I’d say I’ve never seen in the Australian cricket team. Other than a bottlecap once.”
“I don’t remember any conversation around collective responsibility. I don’t remember any team meeting where he [Khawaja] stood up and said, ‘Let’s own this as a team.’”
“I think that investigation was a proper way to do it. I think you can maybe argue whether the judgments were fair, but what can you do? I got asked all the questions, answered them all fairly. I think the intentions might be sound.
“If we are talking about how they were sanctioned, my personal opinion was it was way too heavy-handed. Way over the top. So I think that’s OK to say. But to then extrapolate that out into everyone else knew – that’s a huge extrapolation and very different to what I think was an injustice.”
“Today, I’ll talk as Australian captain right now, but also talk about the 24-year-old young guy and his recollections playing my 13th Test back in 2018. In a team that at that stage I think had a win-at-all-costs mentality, had an ugly underbelly, and there was too many silos within the team – traits that I hope that everyone has seen and [I’ve tried] very hard to eradicate for the last six years as captain.
“I hadn’t played a lot of Test cricket but my memories of coming back into that side, there were parts I didn’t really think were OK. I thought that the way we acted on the field was quite abrasive. I didn’t like the way we spoke to umpires, the opposition. I think there was a bit of an arrogance and a bit of an ugliness at times that didn’t sit well with me as a young guy. And now I’m captain, I have spent a lot of time making sure that that’s not the case with this current Aussie team. And I think we have been absolutely brilliant since 2018.”
“I can see how people draw the assumption that … what you’re doing is for the bowlers. The bowlers must be coming up with the ideas. It’s not how it happens. As soon as [the] ball gets wet it won’t reverse. Bowling, running around, you get sweaty, you don’t touch the ball. The keeper throws it to mid-on, you are trying to get least amount of hands, particularly sweaty, hands on. A lot of time it falls on the batter. I can see why people think bowlers must manage the ball. It’s not the case.”
“It’s actually, again, quite a normal thing. We carry sandpaper normally for the batters. But we use it for balls as well around training. You face a lot of reverse swing so the batters want to base it and practise in the nets. We scratched balls on concrete, I’ve seen someone use a Stanley knife, sandpaper use – all the methods are very normal around training so again I think it comes to, ‘There must have been a plan.’
“Maybe it sounds absurd to take sandpaper on the field but to give more context, it’s part of the change room. We may have been doing it around training but there is a leap to then think it’s OK to take it on to the field, but maybe not perhaps as big a leap as some people may think.”
“Of the things I’ve read, it [Khawaja’s claim that he was not given the captaincy because of his skin colour and background] is the most serious. To think that the job I hold is quarantined from people based on their skin colour, it’s a pretty big statement. If you are going to say that I think you have to have evidence, I just don’t think that’s the case.”
“I did get advised this week that some of the things that have been said [in Khawaja’s book] are probably defamatory. I won’t be doing that [taking legal action]. You’ve got to move on.
“It’s been eight years. You’ve got to draw the line at some point.”
