5 times cricket was tainted with racism

Often through subtle references and sometimes in violent ways, the age-old discrimination of people on the basis of race, color, religion or any such class, racism, as we call it generally, continues to scourge all walks of society, even in this millennium.

"No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin or his background or his religion..." pic.twitter.com/InZ58zkoAm

— Barack Obama (@BarackObama) August 13, 2017

“No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin or his background or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite”

Quoting from ‘Long Walk to Freedom’ – the autobiography of great Nelson Mandela, the former U.S. president Barack Obama was reacting to violent racist attacks that rocked the town of Charlottesville recently.

Intentional, friendly banter, or supposedly harmless humor, whatever you call it, the game of cricket too has had its fair share of racist controversies.

Here's a look through some of these controversies that left a bad taste on the game:

Geoffrey Boycott makes racist remarks about knighted cricketers

“Mine’s been turned down twice. I’d better black me face”

Just a few days after Obama’s tweets went viral, in another part of the world, former England batsman and BBC Test Match Special pundit Geoffrey Boycott put himself in a tight spot with racist remarks at a Q&A session, held on the sidelines of the recent day-night Test at Edgbaston between England and the Windies.

To a question on knighthood at the informal gathering, Boycott claimed the honour was handed out like “confetti” to West Indian greats, including Sir Viv Richards and Sir Curtly Ambrose, while ignoring English cricketers since it was last received by Sir Alec Bedser in 1997(Ian Botham was knighted in 2007 for services to charity), and reckoned he would have a better chance if he were black.

Probably intended to express his displeasure at this practice, the racist undertones of this remark, however, was unmissable.

Dean Jones calls Amla a 'terrorist', packed off back to Australia

Dean Jones' contract with Ten Sports was terminated following his 'terrorist' remark.

The most freakish of these incidents occurred during South Africa’s tour of Sri Lanka in 2006 and involved former Aussie cricketer-turned-commentator Dean Jones, then part of Ten Sports’ panel of commentators. On Day 4 of the second Test of the series at Colombo, Shaun Pollock had enticed Kumar Sangakkara into driving uppishly into the hands of Hashim Amla at point. As the South African team huddled together and cameras zoomed in on Amla, who had just taken a good, low catch, Dean Jones was heard saying, ‘The ‘terrorist’ gets another wicket’. The host broadcasters had cut to a commercial break at the fall of this wicket, but microphones picked up this remark by Jones from somewhere in the background and live feed from SuperSport, a South African channel, carried it to audiences in the country. Though Jones was quick to term his own remark ‘insensitive’ and stupid and tender an apology to Amla, the mishap saw his commentary stint with Ten Sports end abruptly.

Harbhajan's cussing mistaken for slur, puts Australia tour in jeopardy

After the Test, Indian captain Anil Kumble famously remarked that only one team had played in the spirit of the game.

The Monkey-gate incident during India’s tour of Australia in 2008, one of the most controversy-ridden series played between the two sides, involved two fiery characters from either side – Harbhajan Singh and Andrew Symonds. The second Test at Sydney had been boiling with plenty of glaring umpiring errors and poor sportsmanship from the Aussie side, arguably changing the course of the game in favor of the Aussies. Adding fuel to fire, the altercation between the duo occurred at the end of the 116th over of India’s 1st innings on the third day of the Test. Harbhajan, who was batting with Sachin Tendulkar, tapped Lee on the back with his bat, apparently saying "hard luck", after he had edged a boundary past slips. Lee did not react. However, Symonds, who had been continually provoking Harbhajan, walked up to the latter and swore at him. ‘Teri Maa Ki’, Harbhajan swore back an oft-used cuss word in Indian language which Symonds mistook as ‘Monkey’. The issue heated up when the Australians lodged a formal complaint at the end of the day’s play, accusing Harbhajan of racist abuse. After hearing both sides, match referee Mike Procter pronounced a 3-match ban on Harbhajan, which the Indians appealed against. Following the ban and the overall poor sportsmanship during the test, the Indian side threatened to walk out of the tour unless the ban on Harbhajan was lifted. Subsequently, Harbhajan’s ban was downgraded to a fine of 50% of match fees, a lesser charge of ‘using abusive language’ was applied in place of the unproven racist charges and the tour went on.

Utseya claims his non-selection racist, Vermeulen targets him with racist rant on Facebook

Utseya's claims that his non-selection had something to do with racism may be debatable since he had been banned from bowling his off-spin by the ICC prior to the tournament.

Zimbabwean cricket, which has a long-drawn, bitter history of struggling with the ‘black vs. white’ dilemma, was once again dragged into another ugly race storm when former cricketer Prosper Utseya levelled allegations of racism against Alistair Campbell, the managing director of Zimbabwe Cricket, after the 2015 World Cup. Utseya, who was part of the World Cup squad, had not played a single match during the tournament. In an official letter to Zimbabwe Cricket, he accused Campbell of side-lining him from the team as well as appointing white coaches and administrators during his stint as chairman of the cricket committee. Whether Utseya’s exclusion had anything to do with racism remain debatable, but the issue went from bad to worse when another former Zimbabwean cricketer Mark Vermeulen responded to Utseya’s allegations. Vermeulen, who himself has had several run-ins with Zimbabwe Cricket, referred to black people as "apes" in a Facebook post. He also went on to write that black people wouldn't have any problems "if we had left them in the bush" and Utseya might be happier if he was living "in his mud hut". Following this racist tirade, Vermeulen was banned from all cricketing activities by Zimbabwe Cricket.

Windies' shock defeat to Kenya, Outlook Magazine lays racist claim on Lara

Brian Lara denied the racist remarks attributed to him in the 'Outlook' story.

A shock defeat for the once mighty West Indies at the hands of an amateurish Kenyan side in the 1996 World Cup. In the midst of it was none other than Brian Lara, batting genius, but irresponsible on the day, playing and missing aimlessly until gifting an edge to the wicket-keeper. An innings that would have deserved a lot of criticism. However, the headlines had something else in store for Lara.

Following the defeat, the Outlook magazine ran a story about Brian Lara’s visit to the Kenyan dressing room. During his interaction with the Kenyans, among many things, Lara was alleged to have told them: "It wasn’t that bad losing to you guys. You are black. Know what I mean. Now a team like South Africa is a different matter altogether. You know, this white thing comes into the picture. We can’t stand losing to them". However, this was denied by Lara, who clarified he had gone to the Kenyan dressing room to congratulate them and said, "Losing to you guys hurt badly but it wasn't the worst day of my life. The worst was losing to South Africa in the 1992 World Cup because I realised we weren't going to qualify for the semis"