The scandal engulfing Yorkshire County Cricket Club has many victims. The first is most obviously the man at the heart of the story: Azeem Rafiq, the county’s youngest ever captain who suffered years of alleged racist abuse, bullying and personal turmoil, including thoughts of suicide. The scandal is a disaster for one of Britain’s most famous sporting institutions, which ought to be a standard bearer for inclusivity in one of the country’s most diverse regions but which is now itself in turmoil, abandoned by sponsors and facing financial penalties due to its stubborn refusal to address its long-standing problems with racism. And it is a blow for English cricket, a sport with a unique potential to bring communities together but whose fans have been let down by administrators who refuse to accept the necessity of change.
The good news is there has at last been some recognition at the highest echelons of the scale of the damage caused by Yorkshire’s refusal to address its problems. After the club’s refusal to discipline any of its staff, despite an independent investigation upholding seven allegations by Rafiq of racist and bullying behaviour, and its decision to excuse the use of the p-word by a senior player as “banter”, the English Cricket Board (ECB) has thrown the book at Yorkshire, as The Times urged earlier this week. Yorkshire has been suspended from hosting international matches at Headingley and has been served notice it could be subject to further sanctions, including financial penalties and points deductions in domestic competitions.
The ECB’s action has triggered the resignation of Yorkshire’s chairman, Roger Hutton, although in truth his position had already become untenable after the decision by sponsors, including Harrogate Spring Water, Nike, Tetley’s and Yorkshire Tea, to cut their ties with the club. Mr Hutton claimed in a resignation statement that he had wanted to take a more robust stand against racism and to apologise to Rafiq but had been thwarted by the club’s executive directors.
Although he did not name them, it was clear he was referring to Mark Arthur, the chief executive, and Martyn Moxon, the director of cricket. He also criticised the ECB for failing to provide him with more support, although it is hardly the job of the board, as the game’s regulator, to involve itself in internal club processes. Yorkshire’s failures are entirely its own.
Indeed, the real question is whether Yorkshire even now recognises the scale of changes needed. Rafiq claimed in a social media post this week that his target was not individuals but what he regarded as the institutional racism he encountered during his time at the club in two spells between 2010 and 2018. Certainly the scandal runs deep, engulfing Michael Vaughan, the former England captain, who denies saying to Rafiq, “Too many of you here, we need to do something about it”, although a second player now says he heard him make the remark. The reality is that whatever he said, few will doubt the prevalence of such attitudes at a club that picked its first Asian player as late as 1992 and which has struggled to bring young Asian players through its ranks despite a large grassroots playing base.
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Yet Yorkshire has replaced Mr Hutton with Lord Patel, a former deputy chairman of the ECB and close ally of Colin Graves, his boss at the board and chairman of Yorkshire during Rafiq's first stint as a player. Mr Arthur and Mr Moxon will remain in place. Yorkshire has manifestly failed not only Rafiq but many young cricketers who will see in the antediluvian response of the board to Rafiq’s allegations confirmation that cricket is not for them. Until it can show convincingly that it understands that this is unacceptable in modern Britain, Yorkshire deserves a long spell in the wilderness.
