CAPE TOWN, 12 February 2003 — Shaun Pollock came to my room early yesterday morning and told me that Shane Warne was flying back to Australia after testing positive for banned substances. This is bad news for the World Cup, because Warne was one of the biggest stars to be on show in this tournament. I’m sure the other teams won’t be complaining about his absence, but it is a big blow for cricket lovers. It is very sad, but right now I’m more shocked than anything else.
The impact of this news on the Australians will be huge, and the team must be rocked by the fact that they will be missing their most experienced World Cupper under such sensational circumstances, and that too hours before their opening game. There simply could not be a tougher challenge to the Australian team than this completely unexpected turn of event.
Things are pretty fluid right now, and Warne says he did not know about the fact that the medication he took contained banned substances, and it could be that he was innocent. Very often, even the most innocuous looking cough mix can contain a banned substance, so players have to be very careful about the medication they take.
There are other reports of some masking substance being found in Warne’s sample, so right now it’s very difficult to differentiate between facts and rumors.
Normally a team doctor helps players wade through the information he has on banned substances, and every sports doctor knows what is allowed and what is not. There are booklets distributed to teams listing banned substances and the common medicines they are found in, but it appears like the medical staff of the Australian team were not aware of all this when they were treating Warne’s shoulder. The last word on this episode is not yet known, and the next few days will be interesting.
South Africa’s defeat to West Indies in the opening match was an anti-climax to all our supporters. It was a great wicket to bat on, and once again Brian Lara played an awesome knock against us. Pollock and Ntini were outstanding at the start, and I was disappointed that I failed to keep the pressure on the batsmen. I think we lost the game in the last 12 overs, when Ricardo Powell and Ramnaresh Sarwan scored far too many runs. In spite of that late onslaught we were pretty confident of overhauling the total, but we failed to get a good partnership going. Fortunately for us, Lance Klusener ensured that we did not suffer on the net run rate front.
The loss puts us under some pressure, and we will be playing our best 11 against Kenya today. We have a Green Team, which is our best team, for the big games, and a Gold Team for the matches against the less experienced sides. Our reversal against West Indies means that we might have to bring out our Green Team against Kenya in order to make amends for our poor showing against West Indies.
South Africa had really planned for the first week of the tournament, during which we play three games, to be a big one. We have started badly, but we will be going all out to make amends against Kenya and New Zealand. (Gameplan)
