PCA admits failings over Azeem Rafiq racism allegations

Professional Cricketers’ Association chief executive Rob Lynch has accepted the union made failings with its support to Azeem Rafiq in the wake of his racism allegations against Yorkshire.

Former spinner Rafiq described the organisation as “incredibly inept” and insisted it “left me on my own” during an appearance in front of the UK's digital, culture, media and sport select committee in November when laying bare his battle with discrimination in the sport.

Lynch told the parliamentary committee on Tuesday: “Look, we had some failings in our dealings with Azeem Rafiq and have learnt a lot of lessons from the last 12 months with Azeem. We applaud Azeem for his courage and bravery for being a whistleblower to create necessary chances.

Our session on sports governance with the @PCA and @PFA has now started.We'll be investigating whether athletes' unions are doing enough to meet the issues facing pro sports, including tackling racism and widening participation.Watch here: https://t.co/hk10BFmwKd https://t.co/vTBpjTyJDo

— Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee (@CommonsDCMS) February 8, 2022

“PCA have offered support to Azeem throughout his career but clearly with this dispute with Yorkshire we did not meet the standards we needed to and have apologised to him for what went wrong. We have listened to Azeem about what can be done and a number of changes have been introduced.”

Rafiq accused the PCA of reporting him missing just to “tick a box in case I killed myself” when he spoke in front of the committee in November.

Lynch insisted the union acted due to genuine concern and also clarified it asked for a safe and well check.

He told the committee: “The action we took was borne from nothing other than general worry for