It’s been more than four years since the infamous ball-tampering scandal took place in Newlands involving Cameron Bancroft, David Warner, and Steven Smith. The players have served the imposed ban as Smith and Warner are back in the Australian setup. Smith’s two-year leadership ban was also lifted in 2020. However, David Warner is still serving the lifetime captaincy ban.
But it seems the fortunes are about to change for Warner with Cricket Australia (CA) contemplating changing the codes and clauses in place to lift the ban. The Australian board wants the star opening batter to take up the team’s captaincy in ODIs after the post has been left vacant since Aaron Finch retired a few months back. Notably, former and present players have called for Warner's suspension to be overturned so that he can be considered as Finch's replacement as captain.
In a board meeting on Friday, Cricket Australia (CA) will review its body integrity code, which will be the initial step in the removal of the captainship ban on Warner.
"The view within Cricket Australia is that David is doing particularly well on the field and making a great contribution. The first step in terms of David's leadership ban is to review the code and see if those sanctions are able to be reviewed. And the appropriate revisions to that code that would need to be made. It's not in anyone's interest for us to delay. It would be in time for any future leadership conversations in relation to David," said CA chair Lachlan Henderson as quoted by Sky Sports.
It’s worth mentioning that Warner gave up his right to a later review of the punishment when he accepted a sanction under the current integrity rule. However, according to executive Nick Hockley, it's critical that the code acknowledges that sanctioned individuals could alter their behaviour. "We are looking at sanctions to be reviewed for good behaviour and growth after a period of time. Pending the discussion, there would then need to be a revision of the code and that would need to be approved by the board," said Hockley.