"Taking moral ground against my son...": Chris Broad lashes out at Lehmann after Khawaja's Sandpapergate revelations

The 'Sandpapergate' scandal refers to ball-tampering by Australia during the third Test against South Africa at Cape Town, for which then-captain vice-captain Steve Smith and David Warner received one-year competitive cricket bans, while Cameron Bancroft was also handed sanctions, including a nine-month international/domestic cricket ban.

Ahead of the release of his autobiography 'Sabr', Khawaja had claimed that the entire Australian team, including players and support staff, was involved in the 2018 ball-tampering scandal during the South Africa tour. He said the responsibility was collective, contrary to Cricket Australia's findings that implicated only Steve Smith, David Warner and Cameron Bancroft. Khawaja stressed that he had expected the truth to emerge over the past eight years and spoke out to ensure the three players were not left carrying the blame alone.

In his autobiography, not only did Khawaja call for the entire Aussie locker room to take collective responsibility for the incident, but he also said that Warner, Steve Smith and Cameron Bancroft were not the sole people with knowledge of sandpaper use and the team had, in fact, used the sandpaper back in the second Test in Gqeberha before getting caught at Cape Town during the third Test.

In the highly talked-about book, Khawaja also made revelations about altering the condition of the ball during the 2017/18 home Ashes series before the Proteas tour by lifting the quarter-seam on the ball. The tactic paid off with a win at the third Test at Perth by an innings margin, which helped Australia regain the Ashes.

Speaking in his book titled 'Sabr ', Khawaja had written, "We were reverse swinging it late on day five (of Perth Test), Khawaja wrote.

Actually, we were reverse swinging the ball the game before too - except it was much tougher, because it was the pink ball. But we - and I say 'we', because we're a team, whether you did the deed or not - had worked out that, if we raised the flaps on the quarter seam on that ball, it was almost like it had a rudder on it and it'd start reverse swinging. And before you start going at me, calm down. The whole world was doing whatever little they could to try and reverse swing the ball," he added.

Now, Chris, also the father of England pace legend Stuart Broad, lashed out at Lehmann, the coach of the Aussie side during the SA tour for his team's use of sandpaper, while also mentioning how the ex-Aussie batter had treated his son when he had decided not to walk after edging a shot to slips in the first Ashes Test back in 2013.

"Darren Lehmann surely knew all about it, Broad said of the Australian teams ball-tampering on Track Radio as quoted by Fox Sports.

And if he did not, he should not have been the coach at the time.I think he has got away lightly OK, he left his job a few months later, but he did not get any sanctions."

And there he was in 2013, taking the moral high ground against my son, where he played the Australian game of nicking the ball and waiting for the umpire to give him out, and he got given not out on that occasion, and then came out in the media saying we are going to make him cry when he comes to Australia next."

And here he is, the coach of the Australian cricket team that brought sandpaper out onto the field of play and denied any knowledge of this happening.I am very angry at Darren Lehmann in this respect," he continued.

Broad got very unlikely support for his tirade against Lehmann from his son's arch-nemesis on the pitch, David Warner, who has so far been supportive of Khawaja's revelations about the 2018 SA tour, with the former Aussie superstar writing on X, "I could not agree more, and thats hard for me to say!

Meanwhile, Khawaja has maintained that his revelations about the 'Sandpapergate' in 2018 are not intended to target individuals, reiterating that he wants the entire team to take collective responsibility for the incident. He also questioned the thoroughness of CricketAustralia's investigation, saying it felt rushed and that he was never interviewed despite being present alongside Cameron Bancroft during the episode.

In an interview with ABC on Tuesday, Khawaja said he was not interested in conducting a witch hunt or pointing fingers at individual players, but wanted the three cricketers who faced sanctions to no longer carry the burden of the controversy alone.

I mean, I have written in my account from what I have seen. I have told you again, time and time again, like the easiest way for me to do it, and people want to know the answers and lots of different answers. And I have left it open-ended to some respects because I have told my story and I have told my truth, and I will speak for myself, and there are other times where I am talking about what has happened in that situation, but this has never been a witch hunt for me. It is only those three guys who have had to cop this flak for a long time. I am hoping other people will come up and talk about it honestly. That's what I'm hoping, but I'm not forcing anyone to do anything, he said.

And you got to remember, Pat Cummins, Pat Cummins is a good friend of mine; Mitchell Starc, a lot of these guys, like the guys on the team, other players in the team, Shaun Marsh, Mitch Marsh, they are all very good friends of mine. I am not here to go on a witch hunt. All I have ever wanted is for us to take accountability as a team, and I do not think that is a lot to say. I am not asking a lot from people, and I say, "We were a part of it; that was us. Let us just take accountability and tell your story. Do not have to tell your story." But I felt for those three guys that kept having to share the load for the whole time, he added during the ABC interview.

Khawaja also said he did not consider the punishments handed to formerAustralian captain Steve Smith, vice-captain David Warner and Cameron Bancroft appropriate. I do not think the ban for the three, I do not think the ban for the three players was appropriate, he said.

When questioned about whether Cricket Australia had conducted a thorough investigation into the scandal, Khawaja said he found the process unsatisfactory, pointing out that he was never questioned despite sitting next to Cameron Bancroft the whole time.

I do not feel like it was a thorough investigation because I never got investigated and I was sitting next to Cameron Bancroft the whole time. So it's hard for me to say cover-up, but I will say it felt rushed, he said.

Khawaja said his intention behind writing about the Sandpapergate scandal was to present his version of events and ensure that the three players who faced sanctions were not left carrying the blame alone. There is no easy way to do it, but I mean, I am not here to inflame the situation anymore. I was here to tell my truth, what I saw, what I felt, and to stick with those three guys that were made out to be the only people who have taken it, and I wanted that to be shown. I will say again, I have given my statement about what happened in the game before and what was called back then Port Elizabeth and where we played there and what happened. And I was honest about what I saw and what conversations I had, he said during the ABC interview.

It has never been for me about pointing fingers and saying, He did this, he said that. And that is why even when I first wrote my edit, there were names, there were lots of things, I pulled it back. Sometimes I am very specific on things and sometimes they are a bit vague on things and I do it on purpose because I am trying to tell a story. But my main objective here is always to try to take accountability as a team. To say, yes, this was happening. And even though that one person did it or the captain knew about it and David Warner always took the heat too for it, that it was not just them, that we were all involved in it as a team, as a squad that was there in South Africa, Khawaja said.

He maintained that he deliberately avoided naming individuals or making direct accusations, even removing several names and details while editing the chapter to keep his account balanced. He said his objective was to highlight the need for collective accountability, while explaining that he had deliberately kept certain aspects open-ended to avoid sensationalism and misrepresentation.

And that is what I am trying to project because it is never black and white and what I have written there shows what I saw and I am happy to stand by it. I am just not going; I am not going to entertain that. And I say this for one reason. I wrote it in my book because it was a safe space for me to write. I took a long time. It took me a long time to first write the chapter, then go over it and try to work out a way that it was as balanced as possible. I did it the best way I could. At the same time, I was trying to be open and honest about what I saw and how things were. I implore people. It is hard for me to talk about this with you to get the right context. There's so much happening at that time. And I felt like I found a nice balance with it at the end of it. And I learned from this week when the media article came out that whenever things come out in the media, they get sensationalised all over the, they're all everywhere and the clickbait, it just runs rapid, he added further during the ABC interview.

Khawaja also said he did not wish to elaborate further on the matter, maintaining that his autobiography contained his account and that he was standing by what he had written.

So if I say to anyone, and I just keep going, I have talked on social media about this and I have written in my book. That is my statement. That is what it is. And I am not going to really speak on any more of it at this moment in time," he said. (ANI)