Steve Smith & David Warner set to resume playing cricket on Australian soil
Suspended Australian cricketers Steve Smith and David Warner are set to resume playing cricket on Australian soil. They are almost set to line up for their respective club sides in Sydney Grade Cricket on September 22.
Former skipper Smith will line up for Sutherland for whom he last featured in 2009, while Warner will play for Randwick-Petersham. The former's team will be facing Mosman in a one-day match and then Manly-Warringah in a two-day match at the Glenn McGrath Oval whereas the latter's club will begin their Premier Cricket Season with a match against St George and then UNSW at Coogee Oval.
Earlier, both the sides, Sutherland and Randwick-Petersham were expected to face each other in the season opener. However, as the per the latest schedule, they would meet each other in round five - around September 10 - which falls in between the second and third One Day Internationals between South Africa and Australia. The venue for the match hasn't been decided yet.
This wouldn't be the first time that Warner and Smith play against each other since the ball tampering incident in Cape Town on March 24 earlier this year. In Global T20 Canada league, Warner’s Winnipeg Hawks got the better of Smith’s Toronto Nationals. They are also scheduled to face each other in the ongoing Caribbean Premier League with Smith’s Barbados Tridents hosting Warner’s St Lucia Stars on Friday (17th August).
Warner played a couple of matches in the Northern Territory Strike League, which was his first appearance on Australian soil since the Sandpaper Gate incident. The third player involved in the tampering saga, Cameron Bancroft, who was hit with a nine-month ban as compared to Smith and Warner's one-year bans, featured in the league as well.
For Smith, however, this would be his first match on Australian soil since March.