Champion legspinner Shane Warne said he worked out who his genuine mates were when he was sidelined for 12 months for failing a doping test.
Warne, the most successful bowler in Test cricket, has recovered from a broken thumb which ruled him out of Australia’s recent loss to India at Bombay and is expected to resume his place in the lineup against New Zealand this week.
In an interview with Inside Cricket magazine, Warne said when he reflects on his time out of the game in 2003 he thinks about some teammates who avoided him in the wake of the drug case.
”Of all the teammates I play with at Victoria, Hampshire and Australia I was disappointed with a few of them. Very disappointed with them,” Warne was quoted saying.
”Most were very supportive. I worked out who my real friends were and who my acquaintances were.”
Warne tested positive for a banned diuretic and claimed it must have been in a weight-loss pill his mother had given him when he came back from a shoulder operation at the end of 2002.
The doping case was revealed on the eve of Australia’s opening World Cup match in South Africa last year. Warne was sent home to face a tribunal and missed Australia’s World Cup win.
After sitting out for a year, Warne was rushed back into the Australian squad for the tour of Sri Lanka in March and has since become the leading bowler in Test cricket with 541 wickets.
After helping Australia to a 2-0 lead in the first three Tests in India last month before missing the last match, Warne said he was looking forward to returning against New Zealand.
He targeted embattled Kiwi skipper Stephen Fleming as the wicket he’d most like to take in the match.
”No more nice guy to him, no way,” Warne told reporters after an Australian practice session on Monday.
”We’re going to test him out and see how he’s going.
”He’ll be one of their most important players because if he does open or bat at number three [and] gets through the new ball, he can hold the whole innings together.”
Fleming, New Zealand’s most capped Test player and most prolific batsman, arrived in Australia on the weekend after taking extra time to rehabilitate from an illness he picked up in Bangladesh.
Fleming said he’d play, even if he wasn’t at full fitness, if he could get through some batting sessions in the nets this week.
Warne’s preparation has been hampered by the thumb problem, but he said he’ll be bowling and fielding at his best in the Brisbane Test starting on Thursday.
”I feel in good form,” said Warne.
Warne has taken 75 wickets from 15 tests against New Zealand, although he was restricted to six wickets in the drawn three-Test series here three years ago.
”It was one of those series that I bowled really well but just wasn’t getting the rewards,” he said.
”I was a bit frustrated because I was beating the bat rather than nicking them.”
Since then, Warne has taken 128 wickets in 20 tests. – Sapa-AP