David Warner expects Cricket Australia: The senior Australian batter is barred from leading the national team.
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Australia batter David Warner will return to the Big Bash League after as many as nine years as he signs a two-year deal with Sydney Thunder.
In what is an astonishing BBL career for a leading Australian batter, Warner had played a match each across three seasons between 2011-2013. Having played his first and last BBL match till date for Thunder, Warner had represented Sydney Sixers in 2012. Three batting innings in the BBL had seen Warner scoring a century, a duck and a half-century back in the day.
“I’m almost at the back end of my career, I don’t know how much time I’ve got left so for me, it’s important to give back for the future of our game and make sure it’s in a great place come the new domestic TV rights deal,” Warner was quoted as saying by cricket.com.au on his BBL return.
Wind your clocks back to BBL|01 🕰 when @davidwarner31 scored the first BBL ton in the second ever BBL match 💯
Nine seasons after his last appearance for the @ThunderBBL, he’s BACK for #BBL12! ⚡️ pic.twitter.com/Ysyw4LDAi0
— KFC Big Bash League (@BBL) August 20, 2022
David Warner expects Cricket Australia to reach out for overturning captaincy ban
Warner will join Thunder as a like-for-like replacement for his Test opening partner Usman Khawaja. Thunder, who will also be requiring a new captain for BBL 2022-23, are somewhat unlikely to find a better candidate than Warner for the leadership role.
However, Warner is barred from holding any leadership position in Australian cricket due to his involvement in 2018 ball-tampering incident during Cape Town Test. The only way for Warner to also return as captain is CA (Cricket Australia) overturning a captaincy ban imposed upon him.
Addressing the issue, Warner pointed out that the ball is in CA’s court with respect to reaching out to him. Open to having an “honest conversation” with CA around his future as a captain in any form, Warner’s ban needing to be overturned had also been endorsed by Australia Test captain Pat Cummins and former captain Allan Border in the recent past.
“That hasn’t really been brought to the table. As I’ve said plenty of times off the record, it’s upon the board to reach out to me and open their doors. Then I can sit down and have an honest conversation with them,” Warner added.
“The board has changed since back in 2018 and when all those sanctions were dealt. It would be great to have a conversation with them and see where we are at.”
An Indian Premier League-winning captain, Warner has led Australia in 12 white-ball matches between 2016-18.
