‘It was me’: Pat Cummins reveals he made call for Alex Carey to stump Jonny Bairstow

Pat Cummins has revealed he was the mastermind behind Alex Carey’s controversial stumping of Jonny Bairstow at Lords, despite Carey being branded as ‘public enemy No. 1’ in England.

Pat Cummins has unmasked himself as the man who ordered the stumping of Jonny Bairstow, one of the most volcanic moments in cricket history.

Wicketkeeper Alex Carey was branded ‘public enemy No.1’ in England after throwing down Bairstow’s stumps, with his form and confidence appearing to suffer in the wake of the vitriolic abuse which included death threats to him and his family.

But Test captain Cummins has revealed in Prime Video’s highly anticipated documentary The Test season 3 that he actually directed Carey to take a shot at the stumps in the defining moment of the Ashes.

“I saw him (Bairstow) do it a couple of balls in a row,” Cummins says on The Test which premiers on Prime this Friday.

“Cam Green was bowling and, (he’d) bowl a bouncer, and he’d duck underneath it and then he’d just walk out of his crease.

“So I just said to Kez (Carey) the ball before, I just said; ‘Kez. Just have a throw,’” Cummins said as he mimics with his hands the action of taking a shot at the stumps.

It was Pat Cummins was behind the Bairstow stumping. Picture: Getty Images

Australia has never shied away from the fact the dismissal was premeditated after players, including Carey, had observed Bairstow regularly wandering out of his crease.

But until now it has always been implied that the ultimate decision to have a shot at the stumps was made by Carey in the moment.

“I think Carey saw it happen a few balls previously, three or four balls previously, and there’s no pause, catch it, straightaway and throw at the stumps,” Cummins said at the post-match presentation at the time.

Prime cameras capture behind-the-scenes footage in the Australian dressing room at lunch where players are feverishly swapping stories about the savage abuse they had just copped from the Lord’s members walking off the field.

“They were kicking off over the fence. I was like, ‘you write the rules you f***ing idiots, it’s not our fault,’” squad player Marcus Harris tells teammates.

Then as a joke, Harris follows up with the quip; “Blame Alex Carey.”

Carey joins in the humour in a typically self-effacing manner when he responds:

“Someone told me to throw it … not sure who it was.”

Cummins was himself relentlessly targeted by fans and the English media for not rescinding the appeal.

What did you make of the dismissal? Picture: Getty Images

“The person I blame is your captain. Why didn’t Pat Cummins withdraw that appeal?” Piers Morgan said on television at the time.

Cummins was unapologetic and unequivocally backed Carey, the legitimacy of the dismissal and the integrity of his team.

However, Australian players became concerned over the ensuing week about the affect the vicious abuse was having on Carey – never before at the centre of any controversy – who was suddenly being crucified as the perceived executor of the dismissal that split the cricket world.

“Everyone projected on Kez and didn’t project on anyone else. It was all on Kez,” Usman Khawaja says on the Prime documentary.

“Looking back on it, I just feel so bad for him what he went through at the time and what his family would have gone through being there at the time. It would have been so hard.”

Steve Smith says in The Test that he could tell Carey was affected in the aftermath.

“I could sense he wasn’t quite right mentally and I can understand it,” Smith said.

“I was worried about him and his well being.”

Carey’s form fell off for the rest of the Ashes and he lost his place in the 50-over team one match into last year’s World Cup, which Australia went on to win.

Pat Cummins of Australia celebrates the wicket. Picture: Getty Images

Khawaja said in an interview with this masthead to promote The Test season 3 that the vitriol directed at Carey – and Cummins – was wrong.

“At the end of the day, the blame shouldn’t have gone to him. It shouldn’t have gone to Patty. And there is no blame,” Khawaja said.

“It’s a team decision.

“We all knew Bairstow had done it and Bairstow tried to do the same thing to me against the spin in the first game, and tried to get Davey (Warner) out in the first innings of that Test match when I was at the other end, the exact same way when Davey was batting out of his crease.

“It’s definitely something that Pat even signalled to Kez the ball before, because (you) could see it happening, see it going on.

“… Maybe in communication, it was lost somewhere there, the blame all went to Carey, probably because he did the act. But it’s never just one person though is it.”

England’s Stuart Broad replaced Bairstow at the crease and marched straight up to Carey and infamously told him the dismissal would be all he’s ever remembered for.

Respected Fox Sports and SEN commentator Gerard Whateley tells The Test that it was clear “Carey had been determined public enemy No.1” by an English public fixated on the events at Lord’s.

Ben Stokes and Jonny Bairstow were not happy with the dismissal. Picture: Getty Images

Khawaja said Carey showed enormous character in the way he carried himself throughout the ordeal

“Alex is by the book. He’s straight down the line. He and I joke around and I call him teacher’s pet. It was a very different situation for him to be in, and the reason I say that is he’s such a good guy,” Khawaja told this masthead.

“If you ask him to do something he’ll do it.

“The team needs something done, he’ll do it. He’s a pleaser by nature. That’s just his personality.

“The way he handles situations and the way his whole family just had to cop it and handle it, I have a lot of respect for the way they carried themselves as a whole family, it wasn’t just himself.

“He was out in public, his family, I’m sure felt in danger particularly in those crowds.

“It’s got to be a tough situation for Alex and he was right at the head of it all and he showed strength through the whole thing. It wasn’t easy for him but he handled himself beautifully.”

Carey admitted in The Test season 3 that he found the fallout difficult to handle.

“Me anyway, I like to be liked. As soon as you’re not, you’ve got to deal with that,” Carey said.

Australia was treated poorly in the MCC Long Room.

Cummins and Australian players were filthy about the way they were treated by Lord’s Members in the astonishing scenes that played out in the revered Long Room following the Bairstow firestorm.

“Walking back into the Long Room, that’s how I’ll always remember the Lord’s Test match,” Cummins said on The Test.

“It was like we’d ripped the soul out of them.

“… Absolutely, yeah, people stepped over the line. I don’t think that’s how you should treat people.”

Khawaja said he had never seen anything like it.

“One of the MCC members started spraying me. I was like, ‘mate, you can’t be saying this stuff,’” Khawaja said on the documentary.

“He was saying, ‘I can say whatever I effing want. Like that sense of entitlement almost. There was probably about three of them I called out. One of them was really inappropriate.”

Originally published as ‘It was me’: Pat Cummins reveals he made call for Alex Carey to stump Jonny Bairstow