David Warner is a typical Australian cricket bully who just met his match

OPINION: Master sledger David Warner has again shown the ugly side of the Australian cricket team – bullies who don’t like it when their victims fight back.

There has always been a mightier than thou air to the Australian cricketers, an often unnecessary need to exert their dominance beyond their brilliance with bat and ball.

Warner has epitomised that with the current side. Aggressive with the willow he’s just as forceful with his voice.

But he doesn’t seem to be able to take what he dishes out as he took his anger off-field in the opening test against South Africa in Durban, clashing in a stairwell with Proteas star Quinton de Kock, who allegedly had made some unpleasant comments about Warner’s wife.

READ MORE:
* Stairwell stoush overshadows Aussie win
* Warner ‘bit of a fool’ – Smith
* Abbott bouncer fells batsman
* Aussies take charge in Durban
* Cricketers’ stump mic protest

There’s often been a personal nature to sledges, it’s seen as a way of really getting under the skin of an opponent, unnerving them and distracting from what’s in front of them, often a cricket ball coming down in excess of 150kmh.

No-one has done the dark art better than the Australians.

But it seems, once again, they don’t like a taste of their own medicine.

Over-reactions are nothing new when it comes to players wearing the baggy green cap.

Think Mitchell Johnson losing his rag in a temperamental tangle with tough Black Cap Scott Styris, reduced to trying to headbutt the helmet-wearing Kiwi out of frustration as he lost the battle of the minds two years ago in Napier.

Or Glenn McGrath’s infamous tangle with West Indian Ramnaresh Sarwan in 2003. When McGrath suggested something unsavory to Sarwan, the Windies batsmen fired back with an even more personal line and it was McGrath who lost his rag.

The wound-up Warner has been a time bomb waiting to explode.

In 2015, on the eve of the World Cup to be hosted on either side of the Tasman, the late, great Martin Crowe issued a Warner warning.

Warner had just been involved in another ugly incident, this time with India’s Rohit Sharma in an ODI in Australia.

Crowe labelled Warner’s act as “thuggish behaviour” and feared that unless Warner’s exuberance was put in check, an on-field fight at the World Cup was a possibility.

Fortunately a fracas didn’t eventuate during the pulsating tournament though the Aussies took their sledging all the way to the final with wicketkeeper Brad Haddin the main culprit with ugly send-offs to New Zealand batsmen Martin Guptill and Grant Elliott as the Kiwis came up horribly short in a one-sided title match.

Haddin later justified his verbals, saying the Black Caps had made him “uncomfortable” with their “nice” attitudes earlier in the tournament.

That says it all – the Kiwis got so into the heads of the Aussies by being gentlemen that they reverted to type and brought out the bully behaviour again. Talk about the ugly Australian!

And here we are again. Is it any surprise that the Australians aren’t too happy with the use of stump microphones revealing the nasty side of the game?

They secured a 118-run win in the opening test in Durban and should be satisfied with that without the sideshow that has dominated the post-match headlines.

The Aussies are up against a hard-nosed Proteas outfit that won’t back down.

Proteas team manager Mohammed Moosajee put some perspective on the ugly stairwell incident, suggested Warner got personal in his sledging and “whatever happens out on the field, you giving something you’ve got to take it”.

And as former South African skipper Graeme Smith noted about Warner’s track record: “We’ve got used to Davey over the years. I think the less interest you take in him the better. He can be a bit of a fool at times. It’s best just to let him be.”

Don’t expect this controversy to disappear. This may just be the start. There are three more tests on the menu.

 – Stuff