Australia batter Steve Smith says he is still traumatised by the aftermath of the 'sandpapergate' ball-tampering scandal in 2018 and still gets flashbacks. Australia play their first Test series in South Africa since Smith and two team-mates were sent home before the fourth Test of that tour.

Cameron Bancroft was caught tampering with the ball using sandpaper during the third Test. Smith was stripped of the captaincy and banned for a year by Cricket Australia, and broke down in tears as he apologised at Sydney airport. "That was a traumatic experience in my life and when I hear the flash of a camera it makes me revisit that," he told News Corp.

Vice-captain David Warner was also banned for a year while Bancroft was banned for nine months. Smith said: "I felt like I was kind of thrown to the wolves through Johannesburg airport. I didn't have any support there at all." The 37-year-old returned in 2019 and was named Test vice-captain before the 2021-22 Ashes. "The mental state I was in was not great," he said. Australia's three-Test series in South Africa begins in Durban on 9 October.