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As he prepares for a semi-final in his third successive World Cup, opener David Warner is not even considering the possibility that this could be his last one-day-international, suggesting he could play white-ball cricket until he’s 40.
“Bradley Hogg played until he was past 40 [43 in the Big Bash],” Warner, 37, says ahead of Thursday night’s do-or-die clash with South Africa in Kolkata.
“Chris Gayle, Shoaib Malik did the same thing. I’m still feeling fit. I’ll have to give myself a little bit of time off after this summer to actually think about all of that first.
“My goal is still to set my sights on playing the T20 World Cup in the Caribbean first [in June]. And I think from there, I’ll probably decide what I’m going to do with white-ball cricket.
“Obviously, you’ve got contracting systems and all that stuff are inside that. So, there’s a lot of things you’ve got to factor in as well. They’re probably going to be conversations I’ll have after this summer.”
This World Cup seemed an obvious point to bring an end to Warner’s one-day-international career, but he is now considering the Champions Trophy in 2025.
David Warner says he may play one-day cricket until he’s 40.Credit: AP
Warner has already flagged that he wants to finish his Test career at the SCG in the third Test against Pakistan, a call seen by some as presumptuous given his modest Test performances during the past couple of years.
But there is nothing so problematic about his one-day form. Warner is Australia’s leading World Cup run-scorer for another tournament, with 499 runs at 55, including two centuries and two half-centuries.
Across three World Cup campaigns, he has six centuries, more than any other Australian player. Ricky Ponting made five. And Warner’s 1491 runs at almost 60 is behind only Ponting’s 1743 at 46, which came from 19 more matches. He is one of just five Australians to score 1000 World Cup runs, an exclusive group that also includes teammate Steve Smith along with former greats Adam Gilchrist and Mark Waugh.
Warner’s musings about playing on in what is now his most productive format contrast with his reflective mood ahead of Thursday’s match, sitting around the pool of the team hotel for a quiet conversation about his remarkable cricket journey.
Brad Hogg played in the Big Bash until he was 43.Credit: Vince Caligiuri
“I think just having that childhood dream, a boy from a housing commission, getting on the world stage, playing with the best cricketers in the world,” he says.
“I’ve been fortunate enough to represent my country, represent the people that grew up with me that didn’t get that opportunity. They wanted to play cricket, wanted to play football, soccer, tennis, you name it, at the highest level, but weren’t able to do that through financial stress, through crime, through bad choices.
“And I’m just proud to sit here today, ride that sort of rollercoaster with people I still talk to today, who are very close mates in my housing commission. It puts a smile on my face that we can sit around and have a beer and they talk about the journey from where I came, the little annoying kid bouncing the ball against their wall and smashing their windows.
“They’re the memories that sit well with me. But for me moving forward, it’s about leaving a legacy behind for kids. If you have a dream, dream big. I had a dream of playing Test cricket but through white-ball cricket, I never imagined that that’s how it would come.
Only Ricky Ponting (centre) has scored more World Cup runs for Australia than David Warner.Credit: Mike Hewitt/Allsport/Getty Images)
“Batting [at number] seven and bowling leg-spin [as a junior], then opening the batting and having a very good career, a fortunate career. I never even imagined that. I just want to tell the kids out there, keep dreaming and dreaming big and you’ll achieve it.”
Warner was a self-confessed ratbag until he met his now wife and then professional ironwoman Candice Falzon.
“My biggest driving force is attitude,” he says. “That’s one thing you can control. You can control attitude. It’s about how you wake up in the morning.
“I was waking up at 10-11 o’clock in the morning before I met Candice. Then my day would start at 2pm. That’s how my days were back then because I was playing white-ball cricket [at night].
David Warner with his family in 2019.Credit: Chris Hopkins
“Candice came into my life. I thought she was silly, getting up at 4am and going to training, like be in the water by 6am, that’s not ideal. Then I started training at six in the morning, went to the gym, and then all of a sudden it’s 7.30am and I’m like ‘it’s actually great’. Jeez it’s refreshing.
“Her discipline and attitude changed my mindset of what I had to do. That was a system I had to put into place. Work hard, train hard and the rewards will come. It wasn’t through fluke that I got opportunities. It was through hard work and commitment to what I needed to do.
“Just get my body into the right physique. You should have seen me. I was much bigger than what I am now. I was much more powerful, but I wasn’t in the physique, where you go like he’s a professional cricket player in the modern game. For me, I just had to work hard and it was an attitude thing.”
While Warner has drilled himself into supreme physical shape, bringing the crowds in this World Cup to their feet when he tears around the boundary, his preparation in the lead-up to matches is particularly light.
‘You lose that sense of the importance of what people back there are doing for cricket.’
Steve Smith may bat for two hours day after day, but Warner often won’t bat at all. As Smith was having another extended session on Tuesday in the on ground nets of Eden Gardens, Warner was only seen twice, once at the start of training for a team photo and then on his hands and knees closely inspecting the very dry and barren match pitch.
Warner’s life exploded in full glare of the public gaze during the Sandpapergate scandal in 2018. The sandpaper carrier Cameron Bancroft was suspended for nine months while Smith and Warner, captain and vice-captain, were both suspended for a year.
“It changed me in the sense of what cricket really meant to me,” Warner says. “When you’re in this [international cricket] environment, you’re disconnected from what’s happening in grade cricket and grassroots cricket – you don’t have an idea of what’s happening there because you’re just not back there.
“Going back there and seeing the canteen ladies, the people are walking drinks out to you, the people who just come and help do the covers, all that resonated back to when I was a kid and I was doing that. So you lose that sense of the importance of what people back there are doing for cricket.
David Warner and Steve Smith playing Premier Cricket during their Sandpapergate suspension in 2018.Credit: Getty
“They’re the people who are the driving force, and that’s what I see now when I go back with my girls at the community cricket stuff – they’re all volunteers. Parents are helping out and that’s one thing that I definitely will be doing.
“I’ve done it with the girls, and I enjoy doing that. It’s the same thing when we go to netball and soccer, so they’re the things that you don’t want to forget. I was fortunate enough that with a negative a positive came from that. Sometimes, bad choices make good stories. And it’s something that you don’t set out to do. That’s just through my upbringing.
“You basically had to fight for everything. Like someone would steal your ball. How do I get it back? I’ve got to go and get it back off him. It’s what you had to do. That’s ingrained in me to fight hard for my position, to be the best at what I can do.
“I want every kid to grow up and be a saint. But sometimes it’s not going to happen. You’re going to have hurdles and obstacles in the way.
“And remember where you come from. We came from nothing. So, you get to my position, where I am today, yeah I might have everything. For me, I’ve got a great family. I’ve got three beautiful, beautiful kids. I live literally a kilometre from where I grew up. And I walk past there pretty much every day, and smile because that’s what made me today.”
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