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Former referee Ian Gould has opened up about the Australian team’s on-field behavior and how they have had to change over time after the 2018 sandpapergate scandal that resulted in the suspensions of Steve Smith, David Warner and young starter Cameron Bancroft. for substantial periods of time.
The Australian cricket team has always been known for playing hard cricket and has never avoided getting under the skin of the opposition with its field sled and mind games.
But Gould, who played first-class cricket in England and was a member of the ICC’s Elite Referees Panel, said the Australians probably took him too far at times with his bullish behavior, especially between 2014 and 2018.
Gould cited the 2014 Adelaide Test between Australia and India as an example of how even he was surprised by what he saw of the players on the field.
“The railway teams used to use a little and it got out of hand. You would go back and think “wow”.
“The first real incident during that time was Australia against India in Adelaide, shortly after poor Phillip Hughes passed away (in 2014). It was the most surreal cricket game for two days I’ve ever known. But for the next three days it was like a war out there, “Gould told BBC Radio’s Tuffers and Vaughan program.
“I think Australia was out of control before the ball-handling problems,” he told the Times.
Gould, who retired last year after the 50-plus World Cup in England, also spoke about the 2018 Cape Town Test scandal in which he was the television referee and spoke about how Cameron Bancroft was He apologized for lying to him after being caught on camera. trying to push a piece of yellow sandpaper down his pants.
“I was sitting there taking care of my affairs when the television director said, ‘I have some photos for you.’ Then I told the boys in the middle what they had shown me and asked them to ask Bancroft what he had in his pocket.
“He reached into his pocket and pulled out a black cloth for sunglasses. Within two balls, the director is back and says “we have many more images”.
Those were the fateful images of the yellow sandpaper and they showed him pulling down his pants. At the end of it all, it was there in front of you.
“At the end of the play, he (Cameron Bancroft) put on the tracksuit, didn’t tell anyone where he was going and came into our room and apologized to us for lying.” You could see he was heartbroken, but he came in for five minutes, he apologized, got up and walked away. It took a long time to do that, “Gould said.
Cameron Bancroft was fired with a 9-month suspension by Cricket Australia, while then-captain Steve Smith and his deputy David Warner received one-year bans despite the ICC banning only 1 game under its rules. Gould said he was surprised by CA’s harsh punishments against the trio, who returned to the test team for the 2019 Ashes series after complying with their bans.
“According to the rulebook, they would have a one-game ban, but I think the Australian public had simply had enough of the team,” said Gould.
