David Warner won’t bite back at those who feel his Twenty20 World Cup spot should have been taken by the rising star of Jake Fraser-McGurk . “I don’t say anything, because people have been asking me for the last five or six years about my future,” Warner told this masthead. “So it’s water off a duck’s back.
” Jake Fraser-McGurk with David Warner in Dubai. Instead, Warner has spent much of the past few months mentoring Fraser-McGurk, known as “the Rooster”, from the moment he sent a Christmas Day text message to the 22-year-old suggesting they play together in the UAE’s ILT20 tournament after the Big Bash League. That move opened the door for Fraser-McGurk to play for Delhi Capitals in the Indian Premier League as an injury replacement, where he scorched his way to a series of staggering scores while Warner nursed bone bruising in his hand, now improved enough for him to fly to the Caribbean.
Between Delhi and Dubai, where Fraser-McGurk joined Warner on a trip where he got an MRI on his hand, the pair have developed an affinity. The older man can see something of his younger self in the brash Victorian youngster – they have discussed everything from Test cricket and the media spotlight to haircuts. There are obvious comparisons to be made between the pair – box-office appeal and audacious instincts to name a couple – even if Warner thinks Fraser-McGurk will need to find a way to balance his aggression, as Warner did, if he wants to emulate him in bec.
