The moment we forgave Smith and Bancroft

CAMERON Bancroft and Steve Smith have done much to redeem themselves with their anguished press conferences, writes Holly Byrnes. It’s time to put away the pitchforks.

LIKE most of Australia, I’ve had the tiki torch lit and the pitchfork out of the shed ready to take to Cameron Bancroft, Steve Smith and David Warner when they got home.

But after his heartbreaking confessional at the WACA, Bancroft is well on the way to redeeming himself with this villager.

Just eight tests into his international career, Bancroft was the dumb stooge in this whole farcical episode, blaming no one but himself for his decision to sandpaper a ball and effectively tarnish his name in sport forever.

His contrition was as heartfelt as it was heartbreaking and while I can see why many will still want him to serve his nine-month suspension for the part he played in bringing Australian cricket into disrepute, he’s started admirably on his road to rehabilitation.

Coupled with the gut-wrenching devastation of Smith, this pair had the courage to face the music.

In stark contrast to the cowardice of Dave Warner, the man named by Cricket Australia as the mastermind of this grossly idiotic plot, this young man has fronted the cameras not once, but twice now — taking his medicine, even when he could barely swallow back the tears.

As the West Australian told a ravenous press pack, he had “panicked in that situation and it’s something I will regret for the rest of my life”.

When he fronted the touring media 45 minutes after that ill-fated third test in South Africa, Bancroft owned what was already clear on the 30 cameras trained on that ground.

He took what seemed then to be yellow tape, claimed he’d stuck rocks and grit from the ground, in an attempt to rough up the ball and gain “an advantage”.

The details were admittedly fuzzy, but put simply, he did it to cheat.

Days later, more chastened and with his brand new baggy green in tatters, the 25-year-old almost broke down in tears, after learning the true value of what he actually threw away that day.

“It was me that carried out the action of using [sandpaper] and it’s not good enough. It’s embarrassing and I’m sorry.”

No qualifications to that apology, no ‘I’m sorry if your feelings were hurt’ bulls**t that usually comes from the mouths of the publicly shamed who aren’t really sorry at all, just pissed they have to make amends so humiliatingly.

Warner who, after arriving back in Sydney, told the media he would speak “in a few days”, could probably learn a thing or two from the young apprentice he apparently schooled in the finer points of cheating.

Bancroft: “It’s going to be a long road and really difficult to earn respect back but that’s the most important thing to me.

“I had the opportunity to take control of my own values and actions and I didn’t. That’s the real embarrassment for me. I’m sorry for what’s happened since then and it’s a responsibility I take on myself.”

The personal accountability was shockingly refreshing.

How he was shocked into realising this game and its integrity was important to so many, more than him and those mad moments in the locker room.

Cameron Bancroft was equally anguished at his press conference. Picture: Tony McDonough/AAP

“The whole cricket family is disappointed about what we’ve done to the game. I think it’s a great shock to everyone and a realisation we need to improve.”

Indeed, Cricket Australia — not without a stained copybook itself, I should add — has plans to make the condemned three work off some of their punishment doing community service; fronting the grassroots cricketers they have disillusioned with their dirty deeds.

How much it meant for these two men to play for their country, play the game they so clearly and dearly love, was evident when both spoke about their regrets in giving up their spot in the team.

Choking back tears, Bancroft said: “it breaks my heart that I gave up my spot in the team for free.”

And for what, we all keep asking.

To please the more senior members of this shamed team?

On the orders of his vice-captain Warner, and captain Steve Smith?

Or succumbing to the peer pressure of a toxic sporting culture, led by coach Darren Lehmann who also resigned in tears.

For sure, there are more questions to answer just yet.

Whether Bancroft and Smith can earn back their places in the side has many variables, including how Cricket Australia does in its duty of care to support these young men to rehabilitate themselves, as well as the game.

Smith’s emotional fragility, especially, warrants a safety net now not more criticism: the pain of disappointing his father a wound that will be hardest to heal.

But whether Bancroft is capable of earning back respect was in part answered, for mine, in the genuine way he handled himself in that press conference.

“The moment I step outside this room,” he said, “is the moment I take steps towards getting back that [baggy green] dream.”

Pitchforks down, there’ll be plenty who will walk with him now.

Holly Byrnes is the national TV editor and sporting tragic.

Originally published as The moment we forgave Smith and Bancroft