Australia have conceded they need to show greater resilience with the bat after David Warner condemned their collapse in Cape Town as “utterly disgraceful” and “deplorable”.
Warner, who was part of the Australian team less than three years ago, delivered the sharpest criticism of his former teammates on Saturday as they slumped to a 176-run defeat.
The former Test opener has been increasingly outspoken about Australia’s selections in recent months, but his response to the latest batting failure was especially scathing. Australia collapsed to 8-62 before eventually losing the match by 176 runs.
“I’m just upset, it’s terrible, it’s un-Australian. There’s no fight whatsoever, it’s disgraceful,” Warner said on Fox Cricket.
“Chasing 288, you’re winning a Test match, you could win a series, it’s on the line, and this is the way that they’re playing.”
“I think it’s deplorable but the batters have let the bowlers down the whole series.”
“Matt Renshaw showed fight in that first Test, but I think the batters have been utterly disgraceful.”
Australia’s batting problems are not confined to this tour. They have been dismissed for 4-95 or worse in 14 of their last 25 Test innings.
David Warner, pictured with his wife Candice, described Australia’s Test batting collapse in Cape Town as “utterly disgraceful” and “deplorable”
South Africa secured a 2-1 series victory after Australia were bowled out for 111 on day five of the third Test in Cape Town
Asked whether Warner’s assessment was fair, Australia captain Pat Cummins replied: “I don’t even know what to make of that”.
Warner was not the only former Australian player to condemn the collapse.
Mark Waugh called the performance “terrible” during the same Fox panel, while former Australia batter Simon Katich offered a similarly damning assessment on SEN radio.
“This has been brewing for a while,” Katich said.
“And the rhetoric is the batting group has had to deal with bad wickets. Well the wickets in this series have (had) nothing bad about them.”
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Katich cited Australia’s two-day defeat at the MCG last year, their first-day batting collapse in the shock loss to Bangladesh in Darwin in August and last week’s total of 99 in Gqeberha.
“If you constantly keep making excuses for players, they will latch onto them,” he said.
“This is exactly what Matty Hayden was talking (about) prior to the series, about mediocrity.”
“If you’re going to allow that mediocrity to grow, this is the sort of performance you get.”
Pat Cummins responded to Warner’s criticism by saying: “I don’t even know what to make of that”
South Africa’s Simon Harmer (right) celebrates the wicket of Australia’s Cameron Green
Katich has been a long-time critic of the suggestion players should go after the bowling on tough wickets, with the theory they will be dismissed eventually.
Much of Australia’s best batting in South Africa has been in patient innings on flatter pitches, as evidenced by Renshaw’s Durban century and day two in Cape Town.
But they were seemingly drawn into the chaos on the fifth morning of the deciding Test, with Travis Head out driving outside off at 2-22 and Alex Carey reverse-sweeping at 4-42.
‘I don’t think we’ve been able to manage those different tempos well enough. It’s something we talk about,’ Cummins said.
‘This series, a lot of the runs that were scored were on the back of those old Test cricket kind of values that you face a lot of balls, it gets a little bit easier.
‘It’s not always the case. So, I don’t think there’s one set rule.
‘But, certainly here, even in Darwin, there’s moments where you will get rewarded. The game will come to you if you dig in.
‘That new ball was going to be a key period … But if you can just get through that period it does get a little bit easier against the quicks.’