I Wish Cricket Australia Had Made A Clean Break - Ian Chappell Unhappy With Steve Smith's Appointment As Test Vice-Captain
Published - 27 Nov 2021, 08:00 PM | Updated - 23 Aug 2024, 01:01 AM
Former Australia captain Ian Chappell has made his disapproval air about Steve Smith’s appointment as the vice-captain of the Test side.
On Friday, Cricket Australia announced Pat Cummins as Australia’s 47th Test captain, with Steve Smith, his deputy, following Tim Paine’s resignation last week following revelations of a sexting incident from 2017.
Ian Chappell questioned Smith being re-instated in the leadership role after he was sacked for his involvement in the 2018 ball-tampering event, known as ‘Sandpapergate Scandal, in South Africa.
The former captain stated that the board wouldn’t have allowed him to play had he cheated during his tenure. He reckons CA should have looked for someone cleaner than Smith.
“If I’d have cheated as an Australian captain, they (CA) would have taken the job away from me and made sure I didn’t continue to play as a player,” Ian Chappell said on 2GB’s Wide World of Sports radio on Saturday.
“I wish that Cricket Australia had made a clean break, but for Cricket Australia to get anything right at the moment is asking a bit much.”
Why is Steve Smith looked upon as a different punishment to David Warner?: Ian Chappell
Ian Chappell further questioned the difference in bans for Smith and David Warner. Apart from their one-year bans from all cricket, Smith was given an additional one-year suspension from leadership role while Warner has been banned for a lifetime to captain in Australian cricket.
In the eyes of Ian Chappell, Smith’s crime of not being willing to know the detail of the ball-tampering and not acting on it was a greater crime than Warner’s.
“For starters, I have a problem — why is Steve Smith looked upon as a different punishment to David Warner? In fact, if anything, I think Steve Smith’s crime was greater. For a captain to say, ‘I don’t want to know’ when cheating is involved, is not correct.
“A captain’s got to know, he’s got to find out and he’s got to do something about it. Either Steve Smith has a two-year ban from captaincy and so does David Warner, or Steve Smith has a life ban and so does Dave Warner. Same thing,” the 78-year-old said.
The Ashes is set to start on December 8 in Brisbane.
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