Jack Brooks is being investigated by Somerset for two separate tweets involving racist language that were sent in 2012.
The club released a statement late on Wednesday saying “Late on Sunday evening, Somerset County Cricket Club was made aware of allegations regarding one of our players, Jack Brooks. An investigation was immediately launched and is ongoing.”
The club has refused to comment any further until the full investigation has been completed.
Brooks tweeted “Cheers N****” to Tymal Mills, responding to a tweet that Mills made about England winning a tour in Sri Lanka.
He also sent an identical tweet to Oxfordshire minor county cricketer Stewart Laudat in 2012.
However, Laudat went to twitter to come to the defence of Brooks, someone who he describes as “a good friend and a credit to his family and his profession.”
In a twitter thread Laudat said: “With regard to the historical tweet that has come to light between my friend Jack Brooks and I, I would like to state that I understand that things that have been said or expressed are now under increased scrutiny and rightly so if we are to address all forms of discrimination.”
He went on to add: “But without context, misunderstandings and misconceptions are easily made. It upsets me that Jacks character is being questioned over this tweet because I’ve known him for a long time and have never been made to feel uncomfortable in any conversations we’ve had.”
Brooks came out with a statement saying: “I acknowledge that the language used in two tweets I made in 2012 was unacceptable and I deeply regret using it.”
“I unreservedly apologise for any offence caused to anybody who may have seen these tweets.”
This comes days after Brooks was mentioned by Azeem Rafiq for racist behaviour during his time at Yorkshire between 2013 and 2018.
Brooks was one of the people named during Rafiq’s DCMS hearing, along side Alex Hales, Michael Vaughan and Garry Ballance as well as others.
Rafiq explained that it was Brooks who came up with the nickname “Steve” for fellow teammate Cheteshwar Pujara, even when the Indian batsman said he would prefer them to use his real name.
In his statement, Brooks went on to apologise to Pujara saying: “With reference to my naming in Azeem Rafiq’s statement to MPs this week, the use of the name “Steve” related to some people having difficult names to pronounce.
“When this has occurred in the past in a dressing room environment, it has been commonplace to give nicknames, regardless of creed or race.
“I admit to having used it in this context and now accept that it was disrespectful and wrong to do so.
“I have reached out and apologised to Cheteshwar for any offence that I have caused him or his family.
“At the time I didn’t recognise this as racist behaviour, but I can now see that it was not acceptable.”
Brooks will now await the decision from Somerset regarding any disciplinary action.
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