Usman Khawaja Sandpapergate Fallout: Who Said What
Usman Khawaja Sandpapergate is back in the news because the retired opener says the whole Australian team knew about the 2018 sandpaper plot, not just the three men who were banned. In his autobiography Sabr, released on November 10, 2026, Khawaja claims the dressing room talked openly about roughing up the ball, and that sandpaper was used a Test before Cape Town. David Warner backs him. Mitchell Starc and Darren Lehmann deny it. Cricket Australia will not reopen the case.
That is the short version. The full story is messier, because this is not a new scandal. It is an old one, reopened by a book, and every person in it now has a different version of what happened in South Africa eight years ago. Below: what Khawaja actually claimed, the fallout day by day, who backs him and who denies it, the Ashes claim most coverage has missed, and what happens next.
Usman Khawaja Sandpapergate: what he actually claimed
Khawaja played 88 Tests for Australia and scored 6,229 runs before retiring in January 2026, after the final Ashes Test at the Sydney Cricket Ground. He was in the side on the 2018 tour of South Africa, and he sat next to Cameron Bancroft in the dressing room through the Cape Town Test. In extracts from Sabr, published in the Sydney Morning Herald and the other Nine newspapers on Saturday, November 7, he says the sandpaper plan was not a secret kept by three men. It was, in his words, open talk across the whole dressing room.
His central line is short: "Not the batters, not the bowlers, not the staff. All of us." He says the discussions about ways to rough up the ball ran through the South Africa series, not just in Cape Town. He says the talk started in the second Test at Port Elizabeth, now called Gqeberha, where the group worked out that sandpaper was effective. He says Bancroft then volunteered to use it in South Africa's first innings there, and the ball swung sharply.
He also says Steve Smith walked away from the discussion at that point, saying he did not want to know about it. That is Khawaja's account, and it matters because Smith was the captain. It does not settle whether Smith knew. It is one man's version, and it clashes with the official record.
Khawaja says he spoke up in the dressing room after the Cape Town Test, telling the team to take it as a group rather than leave three men to carry it. He says he wanted to go public in 2018, once Smith, Warner and Bancroft were suspended, and again in 2021, when the four bowlers issued a joint statement denying any prior knowledge. He says he held back because he had promised Warner he would tell his side in his book after retirement.
He also says he was never interviewed by Cricket Australia's investigators, even though he sat next to Bancroft through the Cape Town Test. "I was sitting next to Cam Bancroft that whole Test match," he said, and he never got a call. He believes that happened because the investigators knew he wanted the team to take it together, and knew he was ready to tell the truth if asked. That is his belief, not a proven fact, and Cricket Australia has not answered that specific point.
One more claim from the book deserves a careful read. Khawaja says Australia were only trying to keep up with South Africa, who he calls "far better" at working the ball. He says he writes in the book about what he heard from one of their players. That is an allegation about the hosts, not a finding, and no South African player has confirmed it in the coverage so far.
The fallout, day by day
No single report lays out the whole week. Put together, this is how the story moved from a book extract to a full-blown row in five days. Each row is sourced in the sources list at the end of this article.
| Date | What happened |
|---|---|
| Sat, Nov 7 | The Sydney Morning Herald and Nine publish extracts from Sabr. Khawaja says the whole team knew. Cricket Australia says it is "comfortable" with its 2018 findings. |
| Sun, Nov 8 | Khawaja posts an Instagram video: "I haven't thrown anyone under the bus." He calls Smith, Warner and Bancroft the victims. |
| Mon, Nov 9 | Warner backs Khawaja on Instagram as "100 per cent accurate" and calls the probe "rushed and botched". Lehmann denies widespread knowledge. |
| Tue, Nov 10 | Sabr is published. Starc, the first of the 2018 bowlers to respond, denies the claims at a Sydney event. |
| Wed, Nov 11 | Greenberg rules out a new inquiry. Khawaja refuses to name names on ABC and cancels promo interviews. Chris Broad attacks Lehmann. |
Who backs him, and who denies it
Warner is the strongest voice on Khawaja's side. He posted a video on Instagram on Monday from Nepal, where he is playing in the Nepal Premier League, and said Khawaja's account was "100 per cent accurate". He called the investigation "rushed and botched" and pointed out that Khawaja was never interviewed despite sitting next to Bancroft. Warner was one of the three banned men, and he has the most to gain from a wider sharing of blame, so his backing is not neutral. It is still the most direct support Khawaja has.
Starc is the first of the four 2018 bowlers to answer in person. At a Sydney event on Tuesday he said: "My recollection hasn't changed from what we said in 2018." Asked about Khawaja's claim, he said: "He says it happened. You're asking me, it didn't." He said the bowlers were not aware anything was taken onto the field to be tampered with, and that they saw it on the big screen in Cape Town. That matches the joint statement the four bowlers, Cummins, Starc, Josh Hazlewood and Nathan Lyon, issued in 2021, in which they said they did not know a foreign substance was taken onto the field until they saw the images at Newlands. The umpires, Nigel Llong and Richard Illingworth, inspected the ball and did not change it.
Lehmann, the head coach in 2018, denies it too. He said: "I don't think everyone would have known." He added that Khawaja had not contacted him, and that books exist to sell. He was cleared of direct involvement in 2018 but resigned soon after the series, and he says he spent four months in a "really dark place" after it. His denial is about the scale of knowledge, not about whether tampering happened. Nobody in this row disputes that sandpaper was used at Cape Town.
Cricket Australia sits in the middle and is not moving. Its statement on November 7 said all relevant information presented to date has been properly considered, and that it remains comfortable with the findings of its integrity process. On November 11, chief executive Todd Greenberg told SEN radio there was no compelling reason to reopen the inquiry. "There's absolutely no benefit in going back," he said, adding that Khawaja's version is inconsistent with what others have said. He also said players were urged to come forward in 2018 and the chance to do so remains open. Captain Pat Cummins is expected to speak in the coming days or weeks.
Khawaja himself has narrowed his own ask. On ABC's 7:30 on Tuesday night he refused to confirm whether the bowlers knew, and he refused to name anyone else. "I'm not here to go on a witch hunt," he said, adding that all he ever wanted was for the team to take accountability together. He said he was not calling on Cricket Australia to re-investigate, and that he was only sharing his version of the truth. He hopes other teammates will come forward, but says he is not forcing anyone. After that interview he cancelled his remaining TV and radio appearances to promote the book. His publisher, Penguin, did not respond to requests for comment.
The Ashes claim nobody is talking about
Most coverage has focused on Cape Town. The book holds a second claim that has drawn far less attention, and it reaches back further. Khawaja says Australia altered the condition of the ball during the 2017/18 home Ashes, months before the South Africa tour, by lifting the quarter-seam.
He writes that the side worked out that raising the flaps on the quarter seam made the ball reverse swing, "almost like it had a rudder on it". He says they were reverse swinging it late on day five of the Perth Test, and that the tactic helped Australia win that match by an innings and regain the Ashes. He also says the whole world was doing whatever it could to get the ball to reverse swing, which reads as a defence in advance.
This is Khawaja's claim, not an established finding. No inquiry has looked at the 2017/18 Ashes, and no other player has confirmed it in the coverage so far. It matters because it widens the story from one Test in Cape Town to a longer pattern, and because it is the part of the book that could draw the most scrutiny once more people have read the full chapter. If it holds up, it changes the shape of the scandal. If it does not, it will be used to question the rest of the book.
What happened in Cape Town in 2018
For readers who came to cricket after 2018, here is the established record, kept apart from Khawaja's new claims. During the third Test against South Africa at Newlands in Cape Town in March 2018, television cameras caught Cameron Bancroft rubbing sandpaper on one side of the ball. The plan was to make the ball reverse swing. Umpires confronted Bancroft on the field.
Cricket Australia sent its head of integrity, Iain Roy, and team performance manager Pat Howard to Cape Town to investigate, on the orders of then chief executive James Sutherland. The inquiry found that only three players had prior knowledge: captain Steve Smith, vice-captain David Warner and Bancroft. Smith was banned for 12 months and sacked as skipper. Warner was suspended for 12 months and stripped of all leadership roles. Bancroft was banned for nine months. Warner was found to have led the plot, including guiding Bancroft on how to use the sandpaper. His leadership ban was overturned in 2024.
Lehmann was cleared of direct involvement but resigned soon after the series. Within three months of the incident, Roy was removed from his role, Sutherland stepped down after 17 years as chief executive, and Howard left later that November. The scandal became known as Sandpapergate, and it is still the sharpest integrity crisis Australian cricket has faced.
None of that is in dispute. What is in dispute, eight years on, is who else knew. The official record says three men. Khawaja says the whole dressing room. The bowlers said in 2021 that they knew nothing until they saw the images. Those three versions cannot all be true, and no new inquiry is coming to settle them.
What happens next
Three things to watch. First, Pat Cummins. He is the current captain, he was one of the four bowlers in Cape Town, and he was briefed by Khawaja before the book came out. He said on October 8 that he had spoken to Khawaja and felt the matter was dealt with then. Greenberg says Cummins will speak in the coming days or weeks, and his words will carry more weight than anyone else's in the current side.
Second, Mitchell Marsh. He played in the 2018 Test, he captains the white-ball side, and he is due to speak on Thursday before the first one-day international against England in Perth on Friday. The claims landed days before a home series against England, and the questions will follow the team into that series.
Third, the book itself. Sabr is out now, and the full chapter will be read far more closely than the extracts. The Ashes quarter-seam claim, the unnamed coach Khawaja says encouraged Bancroft, and the unnamed player he says first applied sandpaper in the changeroom at Port Elizabeth are all details that only the full text can fill in. Until then, the public record is what it is: one man's account, one backer, several denials, and a governing body that will not look again.
For Indian readers, the lesson is a familiar one. Ball tampering is not an Australian invention, and it is not an Australian-only problem. The laws punish the act, but the argument here is about who carries the blame when a team crosses the line. Khawaja's answer is that the whole team should carry it. Cricket Australia's answer is that the inquiry settled it in 2018. Neither side has moved, and neither is likely to.
Frequently asked questions
What did Usman Khawaja say about Sandpapergate?
He claims the entire Australian team knew about the 2018 sandpaper plot, that it was discussed openly in the dressing room, and that sandpaper was used in the Gqeberha Test before Cape Town.
Did David Warner back Khawaja?
Yes. Warner posted on Instagram on November 9 that Khawaja's account was "100 per cent accurate" and called Cricket Australia's investigation "rushed and botched".
Will Cricket Australia reopen the Sandpapergate investigation?
No. Chief executive Todd Greenberg said on November 11 there is no compelling reason to reopen it, and the board sees no benefit in going back.
Did Australia tamper with the ball in the Ashes?
Khawaja claims in his book that Australia lifted the quarter-seam to get reverse swing during the 2017/18 home Ashes. That is his claim, not an established finding.
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Sources
Al Jazeera (AFP) on Khawaja's claims in the Sydney Morning Herald extracts; Al Jazeera on his Instagram video; The National on the book and the claims; The Week on the dressing-room discussions; Dawn on Warner's backing; Telegraph India on Warner and Lehmann; Deccan Herald on the cancelled interviews; NDTV on the ABC interview; TimesLIVE on Greenberg ruling out a new inquiry; Tribune India (ANI) on Chris Broad and the Ashes quarter-seam claim; Streamlinefeed on Starc's denial and the competing accounts; Moneycontrol on the Nine interview and Cricket Australia's statement. Khawaja's claims are his account, as reported by the outlets above; they are not established findings. Reported items are labelled as reported throughout.