Shane Warne died of a suspected heart attack on Friday.© AFP
Following the untimely death of legendary spinner Shane Warne, his three children are in complete shock, the manager of Warne stated on Sunday. Warne died on Friday aged 52 due to a suspected heart attack. The former spinner’s manager James Erskine said that Warne’s children are trying to come to terms with the tragedy. “Jackson (Warne’s son) just said, ‘we just expect him to walk in the door, this is like a bad dream’. I think the three children are in complete shock. They can’t believe what’s happened. I think that’s what happens when you have a sudden death,” Erskine told Weekend Today, as reported by Sydney Morning Herald.
“One minute, the kids are talking to him every day and the next minute, they can’t talk to him. Then they start thinking about, well, ‘he’s not going to be there for my 21st [birthday], he’s not going to take me down the aisle’, all of those sorts of things go through your head. They are having a much harder time than anybody, really,” he added.
Warne was one of the most influential cricketers in history. He almost single-handedly reinvented the art of leg-spin when he burst onto the international scene in the early 1990s, and by the time he retired from international cricket in 2007, he had become the first bowler to reach 700 Test wickets.
Promoted
A central figure in Australia’s ICC Cricket World Cup triumph in 1999, when he was player of the match in both the semi-final and the final, Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack recognised Shane’s achievements by naming him as one of its Five Cricketers of the Twentieth Century.
Shane finished his international career with 708 Test wickets and a further 293 in One-Day Internationals, placing him second in the list of all-time international wicket-takers behind his great friend and rival Muttiah Muralitharan of Sri Lanka (1,347). Shane also captained Australia in 11 One-Day Internationals, winning 10 and losing just once.
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