Stuart Broad raises questions over Australia’s ability to swing the ball during Ashes series

STUART BROAD has hinted Australia may have been cheating during the Ashes and accused the national team of hypocrisy and whingeing after being targeted by coach Darren Lehmann.

MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA — DECEMBER 27: Stuart Broad of England appeals for LBW against Shaun Marsh of Australia which was given out by the DRS during day two of the Fourth Test Match in the 2017/18 Ashes series between Australia and England at Melbourne Cricket Ground on December 27, 2017 in Melbourne, Australia. (Photo by Scott Barbour/Getty Images)

STUART BROAD has hinted Australia may have been cheating during the Ashes as the great ball-tampering scandal continued to rage.

Fast bowler Broad gave an England assessment after the Aussies admitted cheating by trying to tamper with the ball during the Third Test against South Africa.

Captain Steve Smith and vice-captain David Warner stood down in disgrace before day four of the match in Cape Town.

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Steve Smith (L) and Stuart Broad (R) exchange words during the second Ashes cricket Test match in Adelaide.

Smith was later banned by the ICC from the Fourth Test and fined his entire match fee.

Batsman Cameron Bancroft, the man who tried to tamper with the ball, was fined 75 per cent of his fee and handed three demerit points.

On the scandal, Broad claimed: “I saw Steve Smith say it was the first time they have tried it (using impregnated tape to tamper with the ball).

“To me, it’s surprising — why they would change a method that’s been working?

“If you look at the Ashes series we’ve just played, they reverse swung the ball in nearly all of those Test matches sometimes in conditions where you wouldn’t expect the ball to reverse.

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“I don’t understand why they have changed their method for this one game.”

Broad has also accused the Aussies of hypocrisy and whingeing after being targeted by Aussie coach Darren Lehmann before the Ashes tour in 2013 after refusing to walk when he edged a catch in the Trent Bridge Test that year.

Lehmann went on radio and said: “I hope the Australian public give it to Broad right from the word go. And I hope he cries and goes home.”

So when, after day four of the First Test in Auckland, I asked Broad if he thought Lehmann was a hypocrite, he replied: “That’s your word, not mine, but I would agree with you, yes.

Darren Lehmann has been labelled a hypocrite.

“You look at the quotes from that 2013 interview where he basically asked the country to send an opposition player home crying. I didn’t.

“We lost the series but it didn’t make me cry. I enjoyed the series and the banter and all that sort of stuff.

“So I can’t understand why you’d come out and moan about a different country and what they are saying to their players.

“I’ve always been a bit of a believer in sport that, if someone looks you in the eye, you look them back.

“If someone wants to take you on verbally, they have started that fight, then you are allowed to say something back.

“Just from the outside, it looks like Australia have started a lot of fights and then moaned when someone comes back.”

This article originally appeared in The Sun

Originally published as Stuart Broad raises questions over Australia’s ability to swing the ball during Ashes series