Sam Newman reveals his heartbreaking final exchange with ‘dear friend’ Shane Warne

Sam Newman has opened up about the moment of disbelief when he heard his “dear friend” Shane Warne had died, saying he initially thought it was a bad dream.

Newman and Warne had been close friends and golfing buddies for the best part of three decades and they spoke the day the cricket legend flew out to Thailand.

As seen in the video above, Newman said they had planned to look at purchasing a car Shane had his eye on when he got back.

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“He said he’ll speak to me when he gets back... and that was it,” Newman told 7NEWS.

“It’s amazing to think we won’t speak again. It is just beyond belief.”

Newman said, like many others, he found out about the death from a news alert on his phone and initially did not believe it was real.

“On the day I learnt of his death I was in bed and I heard the beep go on my phone, which was beside the bed,” he said.

“I looked at it and it said ‘Shane Warne found dead’. I honestly actually thought I was dreaming.

“I put the phone back on the bedside table and I lay there for about two minutes.. and I thought, what was that? I picked it up again and I just couldn’t believe it.”

Newman said he will never forget Shane’s support after wife Amanda’s sudden death last year after she suffered a cardiac arrest.

“He really cared about how I was going,” he said

The pair had remained “dear friends” for nearly 30 years and would argue about their golfing handicaps when playing together as Warne wanted them to start the same.

“[Shane was] the only man to have a hole in one at the par-3 16th in Augusta where the pin placement was at the top right hand corner,” Newman said.

“If they had the sport of cricket in America, he’s be as big as anyone on