Ball tampering worse than Bombers supplments saga: Wilson

Footy Classified panelist Caroline Wilson says cricket’s ball tampering crisis is worse than the Essendon doping scandal.

Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland is expected to land in South Africa on Tuesday to begin investigating the ugly incident which has left the sport with a black eye.

It has been widely reported that both Smith and Warner could face one-year international cricket bans, which would sideline them for the highly-anticipated Test series against India this summer as well as put them in doubt for next year’s World Cup and Ashes series in the UK.

The Essendon doping saga was described as the blackest day in Australian sport when it was first revealed in 2013.

The Bombers adopted a  program of injecting their players with peptides aimed at improving soft tissue recovery times.

But even though Essendon’s supplement scandal struck at the heart of Australia’s sporting landscape at the time.

Wilson was asked if it was a good call to label the ball tampering saga worse than the AFL’s doping issues.

“It’s a good call in terms of cheating. A good call in terms of the effect on the national psyche,” she said.

But according to Wilson, the Essendon saga could be deemed worse because of the adverse effect it had on players’ well beings.

“The true damage done by the Essendon drugs scandal was the risk it posed to the health of all those young men. It was the health scandal that was far, far worse.”

Former Essendon player Nathan Lovett-Murray received an apology from the club and reached a settlement with the Bombers over the devastating impact the program had on himself and his family.

Lovett-Murray claimed his three-year-old, who was conceived about 12 months after the supplements saga ended, had a growth on her chest in addition to behavioural issues.

“There’s no doubt in my mind that the injection program we were put through has had some impact on my daughter,” Lovett-Murray said.