LAWRENCE BOOTH: The Azeem Rafiq case has been mishandled from the beginning… racism in cricket has all the time been about multiple individual and shouldn’t have grow to be targeted on Michael Vaughan’s alleged feedback from 14 years in the past
As Michael Vaughan was cross-examined in regards to the Azeem Rafiq affair on the Worldwide Arbitration Centre in Fleet Road, it was tempting to ask what precisely cricket thought it was attaining.
Not as a result of there isn’t racism within the sport. There may be. Not as a result of Rafiq wasn’t poorly handled throughout his time at Yorkshire. He was. And never as a result of folks shouldn’t be challenged about unhealthy issues they’re alleged to have stated or completed. They need to.
Nevertheless it was clear lengthy earlier than Vaughan took the stand on the Cricket Self-discipline Fee listening to that the query of whether or not he made a derogatory comment 14 years in the past to 4 Asian or British-Asian gamers earlier than a one-day recreation for Yorkshire was by no means going to be adequately resolved.
Vaughan has always denied saying ‘There’s too lots of you lot, we have to have a phrase about that’, simply as Rafiq – one of many 4 – has all the time insisted he stated it.
Two of the opposite three have backed up Rafiq’s model, however one – Adil Rashid – says he wasn’t offended by Vaughan’s alleged remark, and one other – Rana Naved-ul-Hasan – just isn’t giving proof. The fourth, Ajmal Shahzad, says he didn’t hear Vaughan make the remark.
Former England cricket captain Michael Vaughan has all the time denied saying there’s ‘too lots of you lot’, referring to Asian gamers at Yorkshire
England and Yorkshire spinner Adil Rashid has stated he heard Vaughan make the remark
The incident was stated to have occurred moments after a group huddle previous to a T20 match in opposition to Nottinghamshire in 2009
Rafiq’s whistleblowing about his time at Yorkshire was a painful however essential reckoning for cricket, which has been no much less proof against racism than another stroll of life within the UK.
He has shone a lightweight on a dressing-room tradition that ranged from the puerile to the toxic, and created house for others to speak about their very own experiences. Solely a idiot would disregard the mountain of proof offered by cricketers from outdoors the white mainstream.
The hope was that his testimony would show the place to begin for cricket to grow to be a extra welcoming sport, to embrace those that have beforehand felt excluded due to their race.
But anybody who has adopted the story since Rafiq first went public in 2020 might have informed you {that a} sequence of publicly aired claims and counter-claims, spiced up by discuss of blackmail and accusations of enjoying the ‘race card’, was unlikely to get us wherever.
In a single sense, none of this could shock us. The Rafiq case has been mishandled nearly from the beginning, first when Yorkshire did not take care of his complaints, then after they over-reacted, sacking 16 staff, lots of whom weren’t on the membership similtaneously him.
Issues had been difficult by the involvement of the parliamentary committee for the division of Digital, Tradition, Media and Sport, who scared the life out of the ECB and added to the concept Rafiq was a ‘trigger célèbre’.
The problem of racism in cricket ought to all the time have been about extra than simply Azeem Rafiq
Ebony Rainford-Brent’s African-Caribbean Engagement programme has offered a superb instance of how cricket can transfer ahead
However the query of racism in cricket has all the time been about multiple man – and it ought to actually be about greater than who stated what in 2009. That’s not to decrease what Rafiq endured. It’s merely to ask how cricket can most productively transfer ahead.
Ebony Rainford-Brent’s African-Caribbean Engagement programme has offered one compelling chance. Sad on the ranges of disengagement with cricket among the many black group in south London, she determined to do one thing about it – with spectacular outcomes.
Over 10,000 college students have now been helped by ACE, lots of whom had by no means performed cricket earlier than. And of the charity’s 141 ‘students’, a powerful 44 have entered the county recreation’s age-group system. A lot for an absence of curiosity in cricket among the many black and working-class white communities.
One thing good can come of the ache. Whether or not it is going to emerge from occasions in Fleet Road is one other matter.
