Three years on from my interview with Azeem Rafiq, it’s surreal to see where we and the game have ended upAzeem Rafiq sat well outside cricket’s consciousness in July 2020. It had been nearly two years since Yorkshire had let him go for a second time and it took an interview with the Professional Cricketers’ Association, published on their website and probably read by a handful of people, to bring him back into my mind. The subject was a new business Rafiq had opened with his family, a tea shop in Rotherham. While mapping a future outside cricket, he still had ambitions to keep playing.I arranged an interview with Rafiq because I wanted to know how a once trailblazing Yorkshire...
Hampshire have eyes on first title in 50 years but Lancashire have recruited well and champions Surrey will be tough to beatCaptain Tom Westley (Championship and 50-over Cup) Coach: Anthony McGrath Last season: 4th Continue reading...
Since the triumphs of his playing career, the Ashes-winning captain has struggled to find a meaningful niche in cricketI keep a photograph by my desk of England’s victory lap of the Oval after the last day of the 2005 Ashes. The friend who took it was drunk, so the outfield lists like the deck of a ship. It was shot on one of those disposable plastic cameras, but you can still pick out the players making their way around the boundary.There’s Andrew Flintoff, one arm above his head, Marcus Trescothick, holding the little crystal replica of the urn, Steve Harmison, one hand throttling a bottle of champagne, and Michael Vaughan, dapper despite his tired whites. He has an England flag...
Azeem Rafiq will have wanted vindication but at least we have a decisive understanding of what is and what is not acceptableAfter charges against him of bringing cricket into disrepute were dismissed on Friday, Michael Vaughan said in what was generally a well-judged statement that “there are no winners in this process”. To say that you can only be white, and never have experienced the kind of discrimination that made the process necessary.So let’s be clear: the Cricket Discipline Commission (CDC) vindicated Azeem Rafiq. Having experienced racism at Yorkshire, having found the proper channels blocked when he tried to act, having had his life turned upside down after being forced to go public, he will have wanted, and deserves, for...
Four ex-Yorkshire chairmen want an inquiry into the ECB’s handling of the Rafiq affair, but the new one needs backingWelcome to The Spin, the Guardian’s weekly (and free) cricket newsletter. Here’s an extract from this week’s edition. To receive the full version every Wednesday, just pop your email in below:They have two summer sports in Yorkshire: playing cricket and arguing about it. It’s been this way since at least the 1950s, on into the Boycott years, right up to the present day and the ongoing row about the attempts to reform the club made by Lord Patel since he took over as chairman last November. Continue reading...