The England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) have announced that 5 current and former England players have been reprimanded for historical social media posts that have been found to be of a racist and discriminatory nature. The posts were investigated by the Cricket Discipline Commission which has come to this conclusion.
The development has been confirmed in an official release by the ECB. Each of the 5 cricketers- Jack Brooks, Andrew Gale, Evelyn Jones, Azeem Rafiq and Danielle Wyatt- have admitted to breaching ECB Directive 3.3 which states: “No such person may conduct themself in a manner or do any act or omission which may be prejudicial to the interests of cricket or which may bring the game of cricket or any Cricketer or group of Cricketers into disrepute.”
In addition, the official release has also confirmed that Brooks, Jones and Danielle Wyat, in addition to the above, had admitted to a breach of ECB Directive 3.4, which states: “Each Participant is bound by and must comply with the ECB Anti-Discrimination Code.”
In 2021, when pacer Ollie Robbinson was making his Test debut, a series of tweets of a discriminatory kind, surfaced dating back to 2012 and 2013.
While he wrote: “my new muslim friend is the bomb” in one of those posts, “a lot of girls need to learn the art of class,” was another post that was found problematic.
“On the biggest day of my career so far I’m embarrassed about the racist and sexist tweets that I posted over eight years ago,” Robinson had said in a statement after the incident had become a major talking point. “I want to make it clear that I’m not racist and I’m not sexist,” he had added.
Despite the apology, Robinson was suspended from England duty pending an investigation before ultimately making a comeback.
