Cricket: New book 'Steve Smith's Men' recalls the day Australian cricket was brought to its knees

David Warner and Steve Smith. Photo / Photosport

A revealing new book looks back at Australian cricket's darkest day.

Cricket author Geoff Lemon has described Australian cricket captain Steve Smith as "ill-equipped to be captain of a national sporting team".

While promoting his new book Steve Smith's Men: Behind Australian Cricket's Fall, Lemon told Macquarie Sports Radio that Smith lacked the character, life experience and characteristics to be captain of the Australian cricket team.

Lemon also said the behaviour of David Warner, who he called a "complicated character", was encouraged by Cricket Australia.

"A lot of [his behaviour] it had the support and the active encouragement of people at Cricket Australia that were ranking a lot higher than he was," he told Macquarie Sports Radio.

In his book, he outlines the story behind the ball-tampering scandal and how it caused Australian cricket's greatest fall.

"Ball-tampering has always been a dark art. Bowling teams try to manage their sole weapon into its most dangerous state, but use methods retaining some vestige of deniability, or at least the mitigation of spontaneity," he wrote in an extract of the book published on The Guardian.

"To use foreign objects brought on to the field for that purpose was something else. No Australian player had ever been charged with tampering, and now came a case that wasn't even marginal.

"This was proper cheating. To be caught so fully, so squarely, and looking so amateur in the attempt, just capped it off.

"And if we knew anything, it was that the least-experienced player in a team wouldn't develop that plan on behalf of 10 colleagues of his own accord. This story was going to be huge."

The book also explains the part technology had to play in the whole scandal: "Most apprentice petty thieves don't have quite the same battery of surveillance devices awaiting their every move."

Steve Smith's Men by Geoff Lemon is currently available in Australia.