The mystery surrounding the supposed theft of David Warner’s baggy green caps has turned out to be little more than a case of the Australian team getting their luggage mixed up.

Warner, his father Howard and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese called out whoever had the backpack containing the star opener’s baggy greens to come forward in the lead-up to the SCG Test earlier this month.

His father labelled the alleged perpetrator of the theft as a “scumbag” as the suspicion was that someone had picked up the backpack at the Sydney airport luggage carousel after the team had flown in from Melbourne after the Boxing Day Test.

But now it has been revealed that the bags were lost in the team’s hotel all along, according to a report in The Age.

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A reward was offered and he wore a replacement cap for the start of the Test before it was announced midway through the match that the backpack had been located.

The backpack had been placed in one of the many cricket coffins and the name tag was obscured so it was not placed among Warner’s other gear.

Warner and Test skipper Pat Cummins were coy about the whereabouts of the missing backpack when asked at the end of the win over Pakistan.

“It’s probably not my story to tell. Maybe talk to Davey,” Cummins said.

Warner then added at his later media conference after the final day: “You’re going to have to ask security. I wish I’d played a prank like that. You’ll have to ask Frank [Dimasi] or Stu Bailey [security staff]. I literally got it handed to me and there was nothing [said to me]. That’s legitimate.”

Team manager Catherine Weightman ultimately discovered the missing backpack among the other luggage at the squad’s hotel with another staffer admitting they had noticed it a few days earlier but did not realise it was the one containing Warner’s prized items.