‘Do a Steve Waugh’: former PM John Howard goes in to bat for David Warner

David Warner has received strong endorsement from John Howard who has backed him to do a Steve Waugh and silence his critics | PODCAST

Former PM John Howard during the 1997 Prime Minister's XI cricket match.

Australia’s embattled opener, David Warner, has received strong endorsement from the nation’s original cricket tragic, with former prime minister John Howard backing him to do a Steve Waugh and silence his critics.

In a wide-ranging and light-hearted interview with The Australian’s Cricket Et Cetera podcast, the nation’s 25th prime minister demonstrated his knowledge and love of the game’s greats, past and present.

He even admits to a being lured into the recent T20 World Cup and said he was “cheered” to see 93,000 fans, the vast majority being Australians of subcontinental origin, filling the MCG for the match between Pakistan and India.

Warner, who is under pressure after a string of low scores, nominates Mr Howard and the Dalai Lama in Thursday’s sport section as the two men he has most enjoyed meeting during his career.

“The Dalai Lama was quite cool,” Warner said. “One of my favourites is John Howard, he obviously led our country amazingly and he’s a great character.”

The batsman and the former PM appear to share a mutual fan club. Asked about the current side, Mr Howard nominated Warner as a player in whom he takes a great interest.

“I hope Warner recovers, he’s in a form slump,” he told Cricket Et Cetera. “It’s not the first time (for a left hander).”

Mr Howard recalled Australian lefthand opener Arthur Morris being dismissed 18 times by Englishman Alec Bedser in the post-war period. Warner had similar issues with Stuart Broad in the recent Ashes.

“They all go through those form slumps a little bit,” Mr Howard said. “Steve Waugh did and he came back with a vengeance, that wonderful innings of his in Sydney (January 2003), when he scored his century off his last ball.”

The former leader indicated he may not have intervened in the 2018 South African sandpaper scandal in the same way as then PM Malcolm Turnbull who labelled the episode a “shocking disappointment”.

When Warner’s attempt to overturn his lifetime ban led to more controversy in recent weeks, Mr Turnbull doubled down and said he still believed it was “disgraceful conduct”.

“I bit my tongue at the time; look, it was plainly wrong and I understand all of that, but everybody piled on,” Mr Howard said on the podcast. “Malcolm Turnbull spoke very strongly. I do, by contrast, remember that when that infamous underarm bowling occurred Malcolm Fraser was prime minister and he spoke up for the Chappells.

“He spoke up in a sense, by saying that people should remember how much Australian cricket owes to the Chappell family and of course, I think he generally included in that their famous grandfather (Vic Richardson).”

Mr Howard was amused to be mentioned in the same breath as the Dalai Lama by Warner and revealed he had often used meetings with the Tibetan leader-in-exile as a way of keeping China in its place.

“A charming man, had a great sense of humour, the Dalai Lama,” he told the podcast. “On two occasions I was able to make a political point in a very effective way simply by agreeing to meet him, because whenever there was a suggestion that I should meet him the Chinese foreign ministry would put out a statement saying it would be counter-productive to good relations between our two countries.

“The first occasion I just met him and that was that; on the second occasion it was really quite inconvenient because I was in Perth and the Dalai Lama was in Sydney, but I made a point of coming back to Sydney early because I wasn’t going to be told by the damn Chinese foreign ministry who to meet.

“He’s a person of faith and good will and he’s a fine man.”

No chat about cricket with the former prime minister would be complete without mention of the infamous delivery to the troops in Pakistan in 2005.

A keen cricketer for much of his early life, Mr Howard played for Canterbury Boys High School, then for Earlwood Methodist Church in the church leagues before taking up district cricket with his brother on the north shore.

His greatest moment was a six-wicket haul bowling for the Baptist church side at Tempe Reserve. Most people only know his game, however, from the ball that landed at his feet in Pakistan.

Mr Howard revealed that he’d been asked by another cricket lover, president Pervez Musharraf, to provide help after an earthquake in Kashmir and so had sent an army medical team. A month later, amid tragic scenes, he flew up to the mountains to visit the Australians posted there.

“People often say to me, what is the biggest mistake you made when you were prime minister and I say ‘allowing the Pakistani army to talk me into bowling in Kashmir’,” he said.

“They handed me this ball, it was tape around the inside of a tennis ball, so I tried to bowl it and you saw what happened.

“The story gathered pace and I thought there’s no point in complaining, I just put up with it.

“In a customary Australian way I made fun of my own ineptitude.”