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England Cricket 2023

I've never met Michael Vaughan. I know nothing about him except that he was fantastic batsman and a bit of an arrogant SOB as a commentator. I don't quite know why you think he's 'racist prick' though? Based on the testimony of a proven racist desperate to get an income again, whose own testimony was contradicted by one of his own close mates and everyone else present when this was alleged to have happened?

It's on camera ffs.
 
I mean, the brass neck of the guy for hammering people for racism

skynews-azeem-rafiq-racisim_5587351.jpg
 
Actually the verdict for this specific incident was 'not proven'. but as Strung Out has pointed out Vaughan has made repeated racist comments.
It is only apologist wankers that don't see anything wrong with those tweets
 
Petcha said:
I mean, the brass neck of the guy for hammering people for racism

skynews-azeem-rafiq-racisim_5587351.jpg
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This is an example of why this stuff is such a mess. He was about 18/19 when he posted that. We need to be forgiving of stupid shit people did and said when they were teenagers. Because of social media they stay around for ever when in the past people could move on from being idiot adolescents. Similar with Ollie Robinson and the crap he said.

As a general point not particularly about this case, I don't think it's helpful to be dragging people over coals for stuff they may have said years ago, particularly if they were young at the time. With Vaughan, as this was spoken and not written and not recorded in any way, it was always likely to end like this. Shahzad wasn't called as a witness, I don't think. He says he didn't hear any of the alleged words. He's also a great big tory prick, so I'm not sure I would trust Shahzad. But the point is that you can't trust any of their memories really.

Sometimes justice delayed is justice denied. I think this is one of those occasions. We can and need to learn from historic cases of racism and racist abuse, but we shouldn't necessarily be taking those cases into a courtroom.
 
Interesting article by someone who actually say through the entire hearing.

www.theguardian.com

How 149 seconds of grainy footage made the case for Michael Vaughan

Over four days in a stuffy Fleet Street room, two and a half minutes of video was spliced and diced, with Michael Vaughan’s career on the line
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
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I don't think you need to be a top KC to pull that case apart

The video evidence was also used by Vaughan’s legal team to skewer the ECB’s evidence gathering abilities. The ECB’s director of legal and integrity, Meena Botros, bore the brunt of it as Stoner questioned why they had not interviewed the players, officials or cameraman on the day in question.

“You spoke to Mr Rafiq and you spoke to Mr Shahzad but you didn’t speak to any of the players?” Stoner asked Botros at one point.

“I think that is correct,” came the reply.

“You didn’t speak to any of the umpires?” “No.”

“The cameraman?” “No.”
Click to expand...
 
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littlebabyjesus said:
This is an example of why this stuff is such a mess. He was about 18/19 when he posted that. We need to be forgiving of stupid shit people did and said when they were teenagers. Because of social media they stay around for ever when in the past people could move on from being idiot adolescents. Similar with Ollie Robinson and the crap he said.

As a general point not particularly about this case, I don't think it's helpful to be dragging people over coals for stuff they may have said years ago, particularly if they were young at the time. With Vaughan, as this was spoken and not written and not recorded in any way, it was always likely to end like this. Shahzad wasn't called as a witness, I don't think. He says he didn't hear any of the alleged words. He's also a great big tory prick, so I'm not sure I would trust Shahzad. But the point is that you can't trust any of their memories really.

Sometimes justice delayed is justice denied. I think this is one of those occasions. We can and need to learn from historic cases of racism and racist abuse, but we shouldn't necessarily be taking those cases into a courtroom.
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Nah, sorry, I don't buy that defence. When I was 19 I was a fully formed adult with fully formed opinions and they definitely weren't racist. It's the same defence people always use for some older people being racist - 'oh it was just their generation, you can't blame them'
 
Petcha said:
Nah, sorry, I don't buy that defence. When I was 19 I was a fully formed adult with fully formed opinions and they definitely weren't racist. It's the same defence people always use for some older people being racist - 'oh it was just their generation, you can't blame them'
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It's not about defending people. It's more about forgiving people and allowing them to move on. As one example, my old mate was a neonazi fuckknuckle when he was a teenager. Had the tattoos and everything to prove it. He grew up to become an active anti-racist. The reasons for his former beliefs and actions were complex and I won't go into them here, but people can and do change.

People change. In particular, many people change a fair bit from what they were as teens. They deserve the chance to move on from whatever crap they may have said or done then if they genuinely don't believe it any more.

And none of us are fully formed as 19 year olds. We may think we are, but we're not.
 
littlebabyjesus said:
It's not about defending people. It's more about forgiving people and allowing them to move on. As one example, my old mate was a neonazi fuckknuckle when he was a teenager. Had the tattoos and everything to prove it. He grew up to become an active anti-racist. The reasons for his former beliefs and actions were complex and I won't go into them here, but people can and do change.

People change. In particular, many people change a fair bit from what they were as teens. They deserve the chance to move on from whatever crap they may have said or done then if they genuinely don't believe it any more.

And none of us are fully formed as 19 year olds. We may think we are, but we're not.
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Soz, but I feel I was at 19 - not gonna go fully into a sob story but I was, not because I wanted to. As were most of my friends - we don't seem to have changed our views on racism over the years. Racists are cunts and always will be. This particular one appears to be particularly thick if you read his recent tweets but hey. Let's blame Vaughan's high powered lawyer for calling him out for what he is. A lying cretin basically.


How do you feel about his claim that Yorkshire made him walk his dead child from the hospital to the graveyard?
 
I also note that he's also saying this was 'never about individuals', rather the general culture. Um, you named individuals and destroyed their reputations. I get that there might be a wider problem in cricket, and it definitely should be more inclusive but by naming and shaming Vaughan and when found out to be lying you are totally shaming that person. He's been found out. Again.
 
So you would have condemned my mate John as a neonazi racist cunt (which he was as a teenager, as he would have told you) even if you'd met him a few years later at some anti-racism event?

You wouldn't, would you?

He grew up pretty quickly in many ways as well. I also won't go into that. He died a long time ago, before social media had been invented. I hate to think what he would have posted on twitter when he was a teenager.

But I repeat: I'm not actually interested in defending Rafiq here. I'm making a more general point about the nature of historic tweets such as his.
 
WhyLikeThis said:
I don’t think using that to slag off Rafiq is a good look tbh.
Click to expand...

It was a bizarre thing to bring up in front of a select committee on institutional racism in cricket, that's all. And highly implausible.

I'm not using that to 'slag him off' but he does seem to have a very loose connection with telling the truth. I'm sure, like in every sphere of society, cricket has a problem with racism. I'm not sure this guy's really helping the cause though by making highly dodgy accusations. But hey, you've got your opinion and I've got mine.

Personally I don't want Vaughan to return as a pundit because he wasn't a very good one but I don't for one minute believe he's a racist. He (Vaughan) should stick to the golf course and let's wipe the shoddy affair away although I'm fairly sure he'll sue the fucker (coz I would) for defamation.
 
Focusing on Rafiq is a mistake, I think. Was there a massive cultural problem at Yorkshire? Yes, there clearly was. Those incidents that were admitted by the various players show that. 'Banter' that acts as a way of enforcing 'in' and 'out' groups within a dressing room and is very clearly an example of 'punching down'.

A very similar thing happened in the South Africa dressing rooms of that period. You might have hoped that they would have known better, given their history, than to call black players 'quota', etc. But no, a similar level of racist 'banter' took place in the SA dressing room despite the obvious power dynamics involved.

It's not even about trying to play a gotcha by identifying 'the racists'. It's about changing a culture, and while I think this process has been deeply flawed and it is unfortunate that it went to this kind of disciplinary hearing, the good that will come of it will be the eradication of this kind of culture in the future so that people aren't just seen as their race the moment they walk through the door.

I don't give a toss either way about Michael Vaughan. This process made it about him, but it's not about him.
 
IMG_0759.jpeg

Oh look, here’s the definitely not racist Vaughan, totally not engaging in far right culture war.
 
I'll say it again. Foakes at 7 is the perfect insurance policy for bazball. Kind of a reverse Gilchrist. It would be a big mistake to drop him this summer.

I'd love it if Lawrence had a good start to the season as well. How he gets into this England team, I don't know. If he shows good form, I'd pick him ahead of Pope, but I can't see that happening. Pope has probably done just enough in the last year to merit starting in possession.
 
littlebabyjesus said:
I'll say it again. Foakes at 7 is the perfect insurance policy for bazball. Kind of a reverse Gilchrist. It would be a big mistake to drop him this summer.

I'd love it if Lawrence had a good start to the season as well. How he gets into this England team, I don't know. If he shows good form, I'd pick him ahead of Pope, but I can't see that happening. Pope has probably done just enough in the last year to merit starting in possession.
Click to expand...

Opener? Seeing as 'not being an opener'
doesn't seem to be an issue now.

Certainly it's hard to see how he gets in 5/6 where he probably wants to be.
 
Monkeygrinder's Organ said:
Ahmed scored 85 which is the interesting one I think. He could be a genuine all rounder which would be really exciting.
Click to expand...
Read a thing the other day from one of his coaches saying that he's as talented a batter as he is a bowler. He's still young enough that we can't know exactly where he'll end up. At his age, Steven Smith was also a bowling allrounder with leg spin as his main card.

He was probably that annoying kid at school who was just the best at all sports.
 
I've been out of the loop but if Stokes and Archer have fucked themselves up again for the sake of a million quid or whatever. Then wtf. The ECB should just put a clause in their contract saying they're exclusive. They're paying them enough.
 
Stokes has stated he knows what his best starting XI for the Ashes will be,

What’s yours?

Mine:

1. Brook
2. Duckett
3. Pope
4. Root
5. Bairstow
6. Stokes
7. Foakes
8. Robinson (Woakes is understudy)
9. Archer (Wood as next best, obvs)
10. Leach (Ahmed)
11. Anderson (rotate with Broad)
 
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