The dragged out process to review David Warner’s leadership ban within the Australian cricket team has put his family “through hell” according to the batter’s wife Candice Warner.
Warner released a statement on the eve of the second Test in Adelaide to announce he was withdrawing from the process due to the pressure it has heaped on his family.
He took aim at the legal counsel assisting the independent panel for allegedly making “offensive comments” during a hearing last week and for wanting to make the details of the hearing public.
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Cricket Australia whacked Warner with a lifetime leadership ban for his role in the infamous 2018 Cape Town ball-tampering scandal.
Speaking on Triple M on Thursday morning, Candice Warner outlined how distressing the saga had been on her family to have the events of the 2018 Sandpapergate scandal brought back up in the middle of the Test summer.
“We live it day-to-day, the pain doesn’t go away,” she said. “It’s still raw, we go to the cricket so often to watch David play and we still get people screaming things out.
“My daughters have their father’s jersey on with their father’s name on the back. The fact my daughters have to cop abuse because of incidents that have happened in the past is not fair.
“Dave’s statement was very powerful and it had to be.
“I refer to his statement where he says family comes first. There’s more important things than cricket and (David) is fiercely protective of his family and he just couldn’t … there are more important things than cricket and that’s the bottom line.
“We have been through hell.”
Cricket Australia initially did not want the review to become public, but lawyers and counsel wanted a public review to clear the air over the events of 2018.
Candice Warner described the process as “outrageous”.
“He was told last week before the Perth Test that it was going to be a public trial and not just himself, but players and coaches would have to be cross-examined, it’s just outrageous,” she said.
“It’s just unnecessary, it’s not what it was supposed to be about.
“Is it for David, for the team, or for the panel’s best interests? The fact they used words like ‘cleansing’, to me is a joke.
“That’s not what he wanted and I don’t think it’s what Cricket Australia wanted either. But the panel was very adamant that they wanted it public.”
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