The past fortnight has been shameful for English cricket and its fans, with Azeem Rafiq exposing Yorkshire CCC as “institutionally racist”.
Yesterday saw the former cricketer sit in front of a parliamentary committee to recount the “inhuman treatment” that he received at the hands of the county whom he once captained.
Rafiq revealed that he endured horrific racial abuse and bullying throughout his time at Yorkshire, which he says was down to his Pakistani heritage.
Many have praised the 30-year-old for his bravery and courage in speaking out about a topic which led to him contemplating suicide.
“Seismic change” was demanded by Rafiq throughout all levels of the game, sparking a fierce backing from the British Asian community.
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So how far down the cricketing ladder does this truly stretch and how prevalent is racism at different levels of the game?
Local reporter Archie Connolly spoke to Nick Tracey, Club Captain for the University of Gloucestershire’s cricket team and had a discussion surrounding racism and the drinking culture surrounding university sport.
“I think there’s some racist issues which are prominent within the cricketing community and obviously it needs to be stamped out.
Here at UOG we take a zero-tolerance policy towards racism and that’s something that I look to enforce as a club captain.”
You don’t have to look far to find all sorts of controversy surrounding university drinking culture, especially surrounding sports societies.
Rafiq repeatedly stressed the lack of care and awareness over his strict Muslim beliefs, which of course permit him from drinking.
He revealed one shocking story of being pinned down at the age of 15 and having red wine poured down his throat at his local cricket club.
A heart-breaking comment came from Rafiq in relation to his son playing cricket:
“I can’t imagine a parent, hearing me speak today, would want their child to go anywhere near cricket.
I don’t want my son to go anywhere near the game. As a parent, I’d say keep an eye on your kids because this is reality. I would not let my kid go there and just leave them in the hands of these people.”
Furthermore, there is clear video evidence of this complete disregard for his religious reliefs in a video from an interview after a promotion-clinching performance against Essex.
Ex-England opener Adam Lyth comes up behind Rafiq only to pour the contents of a can of beer over the all rounders head.
You can see how noticeably uncomfortable and upset Rafiq is considering what has just happened, gingerly asking the interviewer to move away from where he is stood.
Rafiq’s drinking was brought up by MP’s yesterday and when asked why he participated in it throughout his time at Yorkshire he stated:
“I’ve been clear from the offset, I wasn’t perfect. There’s things I did that I felt I had to do to fit in and try and achieve my dreams.
“I’m not proud of them. It’s something that I deeply regret but it has no relation to racism.”
When asked about UOG Cricket’s attitude towards drinking and inclusion within the club Tracey revealed:
“We have a lot of people who come to this club who just want to play cricket and are still equally important members of the club.
I think the drinking culture has numbed itself in the last few years and as a club we’ve been focusing more on cricket rather than social culture.”
For young Asian cricketers, it is Rafiq’s aim to encourage them to speak out against racism and hopefully inspire change in the attitudes of those who either are racist or are the victim of it.
So what’s next?
Each and every one of the incidents Rafiq alluded too have absolutely no place in society and more must be done, nationwide, to educate people on the damages of anti-Muslim hate and Islamophobia.
As a result of the inquiry, Rafiq has been a driving force in having genuine plans pushed through in an attempt to seriously tackle racism, discrimination and hate throughout all aspects of life.
Subsequently, The ECB has also promised an 11 point plan labelled as the “South Asian Action Plan” which can be found in the link below:
https://www.ecb.co.uk/south-asian-action-plan
As more players and members of the public come forward to highlight this issue, it must act as a turning point in how racism is dealt with in not only cricket, but wider society in general.
