Tim Paine sandpapergate revelations: Physical dressingroom divide kept Aussies in dark     

As threads of the infamous sandpaper story emerge, new photos expose the divide in the Aussie dressingroom that prove the ball tampering plot could have easily been hidden.

As fresh threads of the infamous Sandpapergate story emerge, new photos expose the physical divide in the dressing room which Tim Paine claims kept Australian teammates in the dark.

Paine and former South African captain Faf du Plessis have both revealed separate accounts of the 2018 scandal this week as the game braces for what David Warner might divulge when he eventually writes a book of his own.

Both Paine and du Plessis accuse the other team of employing dodgy tactics from the first Test of the series, with Paine also making the stunning claim that South Africa was guilty of tampering in the final Test, only for the local TV network to mysteriously “lose” the footage.

Despite the finger-pointing, Paine and du Plessis ultimately agreed that ‘tampering’ with the ball was a common practice in world cricket and that the career-altering penalties handed down to Steve Smith, Cameron Bancroft and Warner were too extreme.

In Paine’s new book, ‘The Price Paid’, the retired wicketkeeper admits the Australian team should have stood together and taken shared responsibility for what occurred in Cape Town, but was adamant others in the group did not know about the sandpaper plot specifically.

Tim Paine has revealed new details of Sandpapergate. Picture: Mike Egerton/Getty Images

Fans and critics have long wondered how it is possible a cricket dressing room could hide such a secret, but Paine claims the proof is in the unique design of the away sheds in Cape Town.

“The other thing that people should know is that the Cape Town change room is divided by the shower and toilet block and players have to split up either side for the duration of the Test,” writes Paine.

“The coaches are in another room.

“In Cape Town you are literally a team divided. Something can happen in one room and the people in the other two would have no idea.

“… A lot of commentators have said since that everybody has to know what’s going on in a dressing room, but that’s rubbish. Cricketers keep a lot to themselves, even in the happiest teams. Coaches and support staff do the same.”

These photos document the design Paine describes in his book. That the seating areas in the Cape Town dressing room are separated by the toilet and shower facilities, meaning a group of players sitting on one side of the divide would not be able to physically see teammates on the other unless they walked around the block.

One side of the Cape Town dressingroom.

The divide.

The other side.

“Everyone out there was shocked when they looked up on the big screen and saw Cameron Bancroft with a piece of sandpaper in his hand,” writes Paine.

“I was stunned. We all were.”

Paine admits he had previously heard anecdotally of sandpaper being used to tamper with a ball, but not in Test cricket.

“I can let you in on the fact that over my years in the game I’d heard talk about guys taping small pieces of sandpaper onto their fingers, but this was next level. It was a Test match and it was on the big screen and it looked terrible.”

Last year, Bancroft inferred in an interview that it was “self-explanatory” that bowlers knew.

However, the bowlers released a statement in response denying any knowledge and slamming the “rumour-mongering and innuendo.”

Paine has made the frank concession in his book that “everyone was part of it to some degree” – which wasn’t an admission about the Sandpaper plot specifically, but more generally that the team was happy for Warner to be performing the thankless task of being its “ball man”.

There is another stunning revelation in Paine’s Sandpapergate chapter where he alleges he caught out South Africa ball tampering in the final Test in Johannesburg, after Warner, Smith and Bancroft had been sent home.

“I saw it happen in the fourth Test of that series,” Paine writes.

“… A shot came up on the screen of a South African player at mid-off having a huge crack at the ball.

“…Think about that. After everything that had happened in Cape Town, after all the headlines and bans and carry on.

“The television director, who had played an active role in catching out Cam, immediately pulled the shot off the screen. We went to the umpires about it, which might seem a bit poor, but we’d been slaughtered and were convinced they’d been up to it since the first Test. But the footage got lost. As it would.”