Yorkshire 2.0: how Graves plans to rebuild county's reputation after racism scandal

Azeem Rafiq's allegations left damage but the returning chairman nowstrives for promotion and stability

- Simon Burnton

Colin Graves sits in the office of Yorkshire's chief executive, Stephen Vaughan, looking out over the playing field at Headingley on a wet March afternoon, a week before the start of a new County Championship season. Nearly two months have passed since he returned to the club as chairman after a nine-year absence, a comeback that until relatively recently would have been completely unexpected and to some - if not to a membership that voted overwhelmingly to embrace it - unwelcome.

"Leaving here in 2015 I had no intention of coming back here one iota, in any shape or form whatsoever. I'd done my bit," he says. "I got it on an even keel, left it in the hands of good people.

It's disappointing to see it has gone backwards, because if you look back to 2021 it was at the top of its game in every way. It was making profit, it was paying the debt down, producing players, we were doing well on the field. Everything was hunky-dory."

And then it wasn't. That was the year Azeem Rafiq's allegations of racism at the club, and issues with Yorkshire's handling of them, blew up. Rafiq had spoken in public of his experiences for the first time in 2020, and an independent review commissioned by the club submitted a report the following summer that minimised abuse as "banter" and said "it was not reasonable for Azeem to be offended". 

Yorkshire admitted Rafiq had been "a victim of racial harassment" but attempted to keep the report private and said no staff would face disciplinary action.