David Warner blasts his old Aussie cricket teammates as he compares them to teen sensation Sam Konstas
- Konstas, 19, made 60 in a heady start to his Test career
- The teenage playing style resonated with David Warner
David Warner praised Sam Konstas’ bold approach against Jasprit Bumrah and India but questioned why a 19-year-old had to set the example for Australia’s top spot.
Konstas’ scintillating first innings 60 on Boxing Day set the tone for Australia’s memorable Test win, putting them 2-1 ahead in the series with one to play.
As funky as it was, Konstas’ knock also attracted many critics with his daring ramp shots and his decisions to charge across the deck.
The 34 points he scored in the opening session against Bumrah marked the most ever scored by a player in a single period against the Indian and helped disrupt the upset.
The innings also provided a slipstream for Usman Khawaja’s first half-century of the series, with Marnus Labuschagne talking about how it affected his approach.
Bumrah still took nine wickets for the match, including that of Konstas when he beat him with a ball that bounced back between bat and pad in the second innings at the MCG.
The way Sam Konstas (pictured left with Australian skipper Pat Cummins, right) went about dismantling the Indian attack at the MCG has won over former star David Warner
Warner was known for his aggression as an opening batsman – and he says the rest of the Australian line-up shouldn’t have needed the debutant to show them how to play with courage
Konstas’ arrival at the top is Australia’s most eye-catching since Phillip Hughes and Warner, both of whose natural inclinations were to attack.
“It was very special,” Warner said.
‘People will criticize him too. That’s the nature of the beast, that’s how he’s going to play.
“When someone like Bumrah is bowling at you, you have to try to execute somehow.
“What he did in the Prime Minister’s XI shows he has that talent. But it also shows that he is brave.’
Bumrah still looms as Australia’s biggest threat to regain the Border-Gavaskar Trophy with a win or a draw in Sydney.
Ten wickets at the SCG would put him level with Shane Warne’s 40 wickets from the 2005 Ashes as the most dismissals in a single series this century.
The Indian seamer has removed Khawaja five times in this series, Travis Head and Nathan McSweeney four times, and Mitch Marsh and Steve Smith three times each.
Konstas is one of a handful of Australian batsmen to take on the world’s top-ranked bowler, Jasprit Bumrah, in this summer’s series.
His win in Melbourne also made him the only bowler in history to have 200 wickets at an average of less than 20, with his ability to move the ball in both directions and with such accuracy making him so dangerous.
‘[Sam was] be brave at the top of the rankings, but you have guys who have played 50 Tests, they could have been brave too,” Warner said.
“They could have played different shots, they could have come out of their crease and hit differently. Stains [Smith] tried a million different things.
“But it doesn’t take someone with the courage to shift that momentum.
“You have experience at the top of the rankings, experience across that entire line-up. Travis Head took the match away from them in Adelaide with that brilliant hundred.
“There shouldn’t be any need for that guy to come and do that. It’s the way the Australians played, but other people can be braver too.”