Candice Warner says Cricket Australia officials told her to “keep her mouth shut” when South African fans wore Sonny Bill Williams masks to taunt her and her husband, David.
Candice Warner and Williams, the rugby league star who later played for the All Blacks, were infamously filmed in a toilet cubicle at the Clovelly Hotel in Sydney.
The incident took place in 2007, long before Candice met Australia batsman David, but that didn’t stop SA fans from using it to taunt the Warners during the second Test in PE in 2018.
“I was told by someone within Cricket Australia at the time within the team that it’s in the team’s best interest to keep your mouth shut,” Candice told The Matty Johns podcast.
“That fired me up, and David up … we have so much respect for the team, but we’re also human beings.
‘There was no help, at all. It’s sad, because I learnt to just accept it.’
Speaking on Channel 10’s The Project earlier this month, Warner admitted the incident, which occurred when she was 22, had seriously affected her.
“It’s really real for me, it’s the pain that I caused my family, it’s the pain and hurt, like it’s so deep … I just couldn’t take it anymore,” she said.
“I couldn’t take the headlines, I couldn’t take disappointing my parents, I couldn’t take it all, it was all too much.”
