Former Indian skipper Saurav Ganguly is still an ardent fan of Steve Smith, the former Australian cricket captain has been banned for a year for his role in the ball-tampering scandal in South Africa, saying he sympathises with Smith and is looking forward to the Australian cricketer's comeback.
“I sympathise with Steve Smith, he is a fantastic player and hopefully he will come back and keep scoring runs for Australia. Because I don’t think it’s cheating, actually I don’t believe it is cheating,” Ganguly said after launching a book titled A Century is Not Enough, reports said.
Along with Smith, David Warner and Cameron Bancroft have also been banned by Cricket Australia (CA). Warner received a one-year ban and Bancroft was handed a nine-month ban.
“I just wish them (Smith, Warner and Bancroft) luck and hopefully they come back and play well. It’s not right to call it cheating, and I wish them luck, and come back and (play) well,” Ganguly said.
Although the Australian Cricketers' Association had said CA should reconsider the bans, Smith said he was willing to take full responsibility for his actions.
Taking to Twitter, Smith wrote: "I won't be challenging the sanctions. They've been imposed by CA to send a strong message and I have accepted them".
Bancroft also tweeted on Wednesday, writing: "Today I lodged the paperwork with Cricket Australia and will be accepting the sanction handed down. I would love to put this behind me and will do whatever it takes to earn back the trust of the Australian public."
Smith and Bancroft will not be eligible for captaining Australian cricket team for at least the next two years, and Warner will not be considered for any team leadership positions in the future.
The International Cricket Council (ICC), in the meantime, banned Smith for one game and fined him his entire match fee. Bancroft was fined 75 percent of his match fee and issued three demerit points, while Warner was left off without any penalty.
In a statement, ICC chief executive David Richardson said Smith's actions were contrary to the spirit of the game.
"The decision made by the leadership group of the Australian team to act in this way is clearly contrary to the spirit of the game, risks causing significant damage to the integrity of the match, the players and the sport itself and is therefore 'serious' in nature," Richardson said. "The game needs to have a hard look at itself. In recent weeks we have seen incidents of ugly sledging, send-offs, dissent against umpires' decisions, a walk-off, ball tampering and some ordinary off-field behaviour."
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