Australian all-rounder Glenn Maxwell has weighed in Ben Stokes' bar brawl, and felt that a verdict would have already been made if it were an Australian cricketer in the same situation.
Stokes has been suspended indefinitely by the England Cricket Board, pending a police investigation, and appears to be long odds to make the trip to Australia.
“I know if it was me (instead of Ben Stokes), I’d have my contract ripped up,” he said while on The Run Home.
“I don’t know what’s going on behind the scenes with English Cricket at the moment, whether there’s a police report or not, but I know it’s very much something that Australian players are trying to avoid especially since the David Warner incident a few years ago in Birmingham, and since then everyone’s been on a high alert about behaviour off the field and making sure we are not doing anything that brings Australian Cricket into the wrong light.”
Maxwell feels playing with a group that have been consistently well-behaved off the field is a major strength, and has been a large contribution to their recent success.
“We are all well-behaved and we don’t really create a whole lot of headlines off the field with our behaviour, and I think it’s a credit to a lot of our players,” he added.
‘The Big Show’ is eager to know of the punishment handed down to him by the English Cricket Board, as the result may be detrimental to England’s on-field success leading into the Ashes.
“It will also be interesting to see how they’ll replace him because obviously he’s a world class player," Maxwell said.
"We saw how good he was during that Champions Trophy campaign where he scored an amazing century and made guys like (Mitchell) Starc and Pat Cummins look medium-paced."
The 2017/18 Ashes series between England and Australia commences in Brisbane on the 23rd of November.