Steve Smith's career started with a remarkable rise, but where will he fall?

The best since Bradman.

The public face of a disgraced culture within Australian cricket. Steve Smith is today, arguably, both of these things.What was building as potentially one of the greatest careers in the game has been derailed by a senseless act of self-harm.And a failure to adequately come clean in its immediate aftermath.When Smith, along with a "leadership group" he presides over — which turned out to be nothing more than himself and vice-captain David Warner — hatched a ham-fisted plan to tamper with the ball over lunch on the third day of a Test match, his moral authority to lead was left in tatters.Once the Australian public made clear their disgust over his actions he simply had to go. The now former Australian captain has been suspended for 12 months from all international and domestic cricket after his incredible decision to sanction blatant cheating.The door has been left open for him to return to the team and, remarkably, even to the captaincy a year after returning to the game, should he earn it. That offer is a nod to his previous good character.No such concession was offered Warner, who also has been banished for a year.The vision of Cameron Bancroft, the junior member of the team co-opted into undertaking the illicit act, nervously stuffing a piece sandpaper in to his pants on realising he had been found out, will follow him the rest of his career.Bancroft, whose own nine-month ban reflects his status as a patsy in the plan, as well as his callow status in the team, may never play for Australia again.