Yorkshire’s 2019 accounts showed the club had earned just under £10.5m from international ticket and hospitality revenue, compared with just over £3m from commercial income, which would include sponsorship. If so, it would also see the club barred from bidding to stage the final of the Hundred, even if Headingley would continue to be the home of the Northern Superchargers team. These lucrative fixtures, plus a men’s Ashes Test in 2023, could now move to other venues depending on the final outcome of the ECB’s investigation.
Next summer Headingley is due to host the third men’s Test between England and New Zealand, starting on 23 June, as well as a men’s one-day international against South Africa on 24 July. “In the meantime, YCCC are suspended from hosting international or major matches until it has clearly demonstrated that it can meet the standards expected of an international venue, ECB member and first-class county.” “It also agreed that sanctions including, but not limited to, financial and future major match allocations may be considered at the conclusion of our investigations. On a desperate day for Yorkshire, the ECB statement, which followed an emergency board meeting on Thursday afternoon, read: “As a governing body with duties to act for all in cricket, the ECB board reaffirmed its commitment to taking decisions in the best interests of the whole game. I completely and categorically deny that I ever said those words.” It was like being struck over the head with a brick.
Vaughan, writing in the Daily Telegraph, said: “This hit me very hard. Rafiq alleges that in 2009, when Vaughan was still a player and before a Yorkshire match against Nottinghamshire, he told Rafiq and three other Asian players as they walked on to the field together that there are “too many of you lot, we need to do something about it”. Coming on the day that Nike became the latest and most high-profile sponsor to terminate a deal with Yorkshire, the ECB also confirmed that Gary Ballance is suspended from international duty after he admitted this week to using racist language towards Rafiq – explained as two-way verbals between friends – when the pair were teammates.Īnother astonishing revelation came when the former England and Yorkshire captain Michael Vaughan revealed he had been accused of racism within the Rafiq report – an accusation he strongly denied.
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