Shane Warne upset with CA’s treatment of Justin Langer: The legendary Australian spinner has come in support of his former teammate.
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Legendary Australian spinner Shane Warne has joined the likes of his former teammates in Ricky Ponting and Matthew Hayden in finding faults with Cricket Australia regarding their treatment of former head coach Justin Langer.
Langer’s resignation as Australia head coach has drawn a significant and severe amount of criticism for CA citing their ill-treatment of someone whose last two assignments as a head coach were coaching his team to a maiden ICC T20 World Cup victory and winning Ashes 2021-22.
Langer, 51, became a victim of the growing say of players in a sporting environment. Langer, whose coaching style hadn’t been endorsed by some players, was offered just a six-month contract extension following which he decided to step down.
“To treat the head coach the way they have, it’s an absolute disgrace what they’ve done. All of us who have played with Justin [Langer], we are not coming out because he’s our friend or a great cricketer or a Hall of Famer. We are coming out because it’s the treatment of the coach,” Warne said on the Follow-On podcast.
“Forget it’s Justin Langer. It’s just the treatment of Cricket Australia and the way they have handled the coach of the Australian cricket team. It’s been pathetic.”
Shane Warne lauds Justin Langer for his intensity
Readers must note that Langer was roped in as a head coach in the aftermath of Cape Town Ball Tampering Scandal 2018. There is no going into a safe house regarding the fact that Langer had successfully turned the tables with respect to both Australian cricket team’s reputation and on-field performances across formats.
Having said that, it was his intense “taskmaster” coaching style which perhaps was too much to handle for modern-day cricketers.
“We were finally starting to see the integrity coming back to the Australian cricket. It’s not a great Australian cricket team we are talking about here. But all that Justin Langer put in over three or four years, we are just starting to see the rewards for his hard work. His brutalness, his intensity and his kick up the backside to the players. You know why? They needed it,” Warne said.
Warne, who is not known for mincing words, didn’t shy away from calling the current Australian team “not great”. Going forward, Warne expects Australia to “perform” in order to maintain the current winning momentum.
“If they can start doing this for another five or six years. Not to lose at home, beat India away and beat England away. Then we might start talking about this great Australian cricket team. But they aren’t at the moment. If they didn’t like his style and he had lost the dressing room, well, they better start performing. They have to perform,” Warne added.
It is noteworthy that Australia’s next international assignment is an all-format tour of Pakistan scheduled to be played between March 4 – April 5.
