What the English really think of David Warner and why cricket’s great attack dog deserves our sympathy, writes Wisden Editor LAWRENCE BOOTH

More than six years ago, at the height of Sandpapergate, I wrote a piece that began with an unflattering description of David Warner – “the most hated player on the most hated team in the world.”

It was hard, for sure. And the Australians – under the more enlightened leadership of Pat Cummins and the less abrasive coaching of Andrew McDonald – no longer hold that title. (It sometimes feels like Bazball England has replaced them).

But in Warner’s case, was it fair? The question surfaced after he last entered Australian discourse. With the Test team looking for an opener to cover Steve Smith’s inevitable return to the middle order, Warner announced his availability for the five-Test series against India, starting on November 22 in Perth.

Warner, remember, retired from Test cricket in January, having already irritated some by using three games against Pakistan that might have been more usefully given to an opener with a future.

In that respect, his latest intervention seems typical: Warner has always been a disruptor, both on and off the field. And for this Pommie journalist it triggered an unexpected thought: are we, against our better judgement, actually missing the old villain?

The incident further damaged his reputation after he previously punched Joe Root (left) in a pub in Birmingham

Warner also accused Jonathan Trott (pictured) of having ‘scared eyes’ before leaving the 2013-14 Ashes tour with a stress-related illness

England’s tour of Pakistan was an occasional reminder that we – both the public and the media – need to push back on the banalities of press conferences. And while Warner didn’t always sell the game in the way his bosses wanted, he could never be accused of keeping cricket out of the headlines. His truth was often stranger than fiction.

When not punching Joe Root in a Birmingham pub, he accused Jonathan Trott of having ‘scared eyes’ in Brisbane, not long before Trott left the 2013-14 Ashes tour with a stress-related illness.

When he wasn’t howling like the Hound of the Baskervilles after AB de Villiers’ run-out in a Durban Test three weeks before the sandpaper farrago, he was stirring things up at the center of the Australian players’ ongoing contractual wrangles with their administrators. He was never boring, often outrageous. Journalists who took offense to him, including this one, also agreed that he provided good copy; the overlap on the Venn diagram was large.

He even fluctuated between nicknames – the Taurus and the Venerable – depending on the role his team assigned him. And here, against all odds, Warner earned sympathy.

From thousands of miles away in England it felt as if he was too eager to please a team that was grateful to have an attack dog when it suited them, a player willing to cross the legendary ‘line’ that Australia has become so brought a tangle. . And they were even more grateful to have a scapegoat when the sandpaper hit the fan in Cape Town.

It still beggars credulity that a trick devised to help the Australian seamers achieve reverse swing was reserved solely for their best batsmen: Warner, Cameron Bancroft and Steve Smith. Bowlers hate it when someone else even touches the ball without their permission, let alone scrapes it away.

Perhaps the funniest tangent came when, during a tour of New Zealand, Stuart Broad wondered with an angelic straight face why the Australians had felt the need to rough up the ball when they had a revere swing so effortlessly and at such unexpected moments achieved during the axis of 2017-2018.

What followed in Cape Town was an exercise in hypocrisy that the English recognized all too well: Warner was embraced as the team’s troublemaker and was cast aside after the rush as the scale of the disaster became clear.

Warner held a tearful press conference after Sandpapergate, but received little sympathy from fans

It didn’t help that Warner’s press conference came after Steve Smith had recently broken down in tears on his own

It didn’t help that he held a tearful press conference after Smith held his. Smith’s tears were more easily portrayed as genuine, as if Warner – a caricature in the public eye – was constitutionally incapable of remorse. (In fact, both men seemed genuinely upset: the gap between Warner’s personality and his crying in front of the cameras was greater than for Smith.)

And if Warner had played a role in his own dehumanization, can anyone in the cricketing community claim, hand on heart, that they had nothing to do with the process?

Warner also provided column inches on the field, as he was one of the few non-English players who could reliably interest English sports editors. His increasingly one-sided fight with Broad generated thousands of words, many of them laced with schadenfreude.

England loved to take his wicket, not just because there always seemed to be a score to settle, but because he could be destructive – at home, that is, not abroad. Of 35 Ashes innings in this country he averaged 26; from 19 in India, 21. He didn’t score a Test century in either, a yawning chasm on the CV of a player who aspired to greatness and occasionally touched it.

In Australia it was a different matter. In his first home Ashes, in 2013-14, he seemed forever to be the man to rub England’s noses with a sadistic third-innings score after a big lead: 124 in Brisbane, 83 not out in Adelaide, 112 in Perth . That also seemed to fit his character.

Warner has mellowed after marrying Candice Falzon (right) and becoming a father

Warner has been brutalized by the public but could now end his career on a high in Australia as he is set to captain Sydney Thunder in the upcoming Big Bash

But what was that character? In England we probably never got the full story, even as we wondered why sections of the Australian media seemed so determined to save Warner from – from what? – themselves.

Other movements would emerge. He had paid his parents’ credit card bills. He mellowed out after he married Candice Falzon and became a father. He practiced mindfulness. He and his family were brutally treated by the South African mob.

When Cricket Australia’s conduct committee last week lifted the lifetime captaincy ban imposed after Sandpapergate, the wording praised the fact that he is “no longer trolling or trying to provoke the other team”. It was tempting to shout, “Rosette for Davey!”

On the other hand, if and when he leads Sydney Thunder at the Big Bash, it will be strange to rediscover the Venerable instead of the Bull. What will Warner be if he isn’t hated? It’s unclear – and somewhat disturbing.

The Pakistani soap opera continues

No sooner had Shan Masood scored an unbeaten 23 off six balls to seal Pakistan’s win over England, their first Test triumph at home against any country since early 2021, than he was ridiculed live on TV by Ramiz Raja.

Masood is one of the game’s good guys, although he can be blamed for losing his rag in the incessant soap opera that is Pakistan cricket. On Monday, Gary Kirsten stepped down as white-ball coach after not presiding over a single one-day international.

Now, in his greatest moment, he was mocked for the six defeats that preceded the two victories. “How did you achieve this anyway?” Ramiz wondered. ‘Six defeats in a row. I mean, even if you try…’ Masood tried to give an answer, but it didn’t help: the victory over England might never have happened.

Shan Masood hit the winning runs to guide Pakistan to a series victory over England

But just minutes later, Masood was ridiculed on live TV by commentator Ramiz Raja (pictured)

Bazball still gets the best from England

The suspicion that every Test is a referendum on Bazball has never been truer than in Pakistan. Bazball is not – I repeat, not – a guarantee of victory, but an attempt to get the best out of a group of players who, man for man, are inferior to Australia and India, and who must therefore try something different.

It doesn’t always work, and England’s problems with turning on the track are nothing new. But this was only their second defeat in nine series under Brendon McCullum and Ben Stokes, and it included their biggest total outside the non-timeless Tests.

It’s certainly better than what came before.

Despite losing in Pakistan, Ben Stokes and Brendon McCullum still give this England team the best chance of winning games with their Bazball approach

New Zealand’s history makers crush Gamball

An apology. This column may have given the impression a few weeks ago that India – and ‘Gamball’ – had cracked the cricket code and were about to embark on a thousand-year unbeaten run. We had counted without New Zealand, who last week in Pune became the first visiting team to win a Test series in India in 12 years – the biggest result in their history.