- Sales of new spin king memorabilia will benefit charity
- Includes new pieces made especially to reflect Warne
Spin king Shane Warne used to boast about being the champion Monopoly player in his family – and now he’s been remembered in a special version of the wildly successful board game, complete with some touching references to his life.
The Shane Warne Legacy Limited Edition game is packed with nods to the record-setting cricket icon, who died of a heart attack in Thailand in March 2022 at just 52 years of age.
The community chest and chance cards in the game dedicated to him feature reference Warnie’s love of baked beans, exotic cars and golf, and the tokens players use to mark their position on the board include a set of stumps, slice of pizza – another of the bowler’s favourite foods – a hand holding a cricket ball in the leg-spin position, and the sort of floppy hat he wore in the field for Australia.
On top of that, the usual properties on the board have been replaced by famous locations like the MCG, and England’s famous Lord’s and Oval cricket grounds – and the most expensive spot on the board references his famous ‘ball of the century’ to England’s Mike Gatting.
Just over five years ago, Warne took to Instagram to reveal his love of the board game, writing: ‘Just walked down Mayfair and it reminded me that I still hold the monopoly trophy in the Warne household Hahahah!’
His son Jackson and daughter Brooke have fond memories of playing against their father.
‘We would always look forward to our Monopoly tournaments at home and I would never win,’ Brooke said.
‘It was always down to Jackson and Dad and things got so heated some nights.
‘Every game we played with Dad was always special. Even if boards did get flipped we were always so happy we were all playing together.’
‘It was probably the biggest family board game we used to play,’ Jackson told Sunrise on Thursday.
‘If you had told me that Dad was going to have a board in his honour, based on his life and achievements, I would’ve said that’s too good to be true because he’s had stands [named after him], he’s got ovals, but to have a board that the Australian public and people all around the world can play … it will be really cool.’
The game will be unveiled on Thursday at Melbourne’s Junction Oval – home of Warne’s beloved St Kilda AFL club – in front of the stand named in his honour.
Known as the ‘sheik of tweak,’ Warne has received several honours since his untimely death.
In addition to the stand at Junction Oval, he also has his name on the former Great Southern Stand at the MCG, and was made an Officer of the Order of Australia – one of the country’s highest accolades.
His memory also lives on through famous friends like Coldplay frontman Chris Martin, who dedicated songs to him during the band’s tour of Australia earlier this month.
‘Our brother, we miss you. Every time we come to Melbourne, it used to be fun to hang out with Shane and all the Warne family,’ Martin told the crowd at their Marvel Stadium concert.
‘I don’t want to talk about it too much or I’ll start to cry.’
At the end of another show, after the band had thanked the audience, the singer revealed a Melbourne Stars jersey with Warne’s iconic No.23 on the back, showing it to the crowd before hanging it on his microphone stand.
Warne was a giant of the game, taking a staggering 708 wickets in his 145 Tests for Australia – which was a world record until it was broken by Sri Lanka’s Muttiah Muralitharan in 2007.
His ball to Gatting is among the most famous deliveries in cricket history, and he also moved into commentary and charity work once he retired from all forms of the game in 2013.
Warne’s life off the field also made headlines, especially when he kicked off a long-running romance with movie star Elizabeth Hurley.
The pair were engaged at one stage and were together from 2010 to 2013, and Hurley sent a heartfelt message to Shane’s daughters Brooke and Summer after their father’s death March 2022, telling them: ‘Your daddy loved you with all his heart!’
