Azeem Rafiq, Andrew Gale among five cricketers reprimanded for historic social-media posts

Azeem Rafiq says that his reprimand from the Cricket Discipline Commission (CDC) is "deserved" and that he will "fully accept" the panel's judgement, after he and four other cricketers were punished for historic and prejudicial social media posts.

Rafiq, along with former Yorkshire coach Andrew Gale, Somerset seamer Jack Brooks and prominent women's players Danni Wyatt and Eve Jones were charged earlier this year for respective breaches of ECB Directive 3.3 which pertains to bringing the game of cricket into disrepute.

Brooks, Jones and Wyatt also admitted a breach of ECB Directive 3.4, which requires that all players abide by the ECB Anti-Discrimination Code. However, the CDC Adjudicator, Chris Tickle, decided that a reprimand would suffice in all five cases.

The cases came to light in the midst of the racism scandal that beset English cricket last year, and Rafiq - whose revelations of an institutionally racist culture at Yorkshire ultimately led to him testifying before a parliamentary select committee - reiterated after the CDC's decision that he was "ashamed and embarrassed" for his own anti-Semitic actions in a social media exchange dating back to 2011.

In a Facebook exchange, reproduced in full in the CDC judgement, Rafiq and his former England Under-19 team-mate Ateeq Javid joked about how a third, unnamed, team-mate was a "jew" for failing to pay his share of a bill at a restaurant.

The messages were first published in the Times on November 18, 2021, leading to a same-day apology from Rafiq on social media, and confirmation that they had subsequently been deleted from his profile.

"This summer, I unequivocally accepted a charge from the ECB regarding my antisemitic social media post from 2011," Rafiq wrote in the wake of the judgement.

"You will hear no complaint from me about the CDC's decision today. It is deserved and I fully accept this reprimand. I want to repeat my apology to the Jewish community. I remain ashamed and embarrassed."

Rafiq met with Holocaust survivors after the incident, including on this year's March of the Living at Auschwitz.

"I hope I have demonstrated over the past 10-11 months that I am trying to educate myself about the horrors and prejudice the Jewish community has historically - and continues - to face," he added.

"I will keep trying and I thank the Jewish community for the forgiveness and kindness that has been shown to me so far."

Gale, who has said that he is "moving on with his life" and will "not engage" with the ECB's disciplinary process, after being sacked by Yorkshire at the height of the racism scandal, was found in November 2021 to have used an anti-Semitic slur in a Twitter exchange with Paul Dews, the then-head of media relations at Leeds United.

Wyatt and Jones were photographed in "blackface" at a Caribbean-themed party dating back to 2013, while Brooks was found to have used a racially offensive term in two tweets from 2012 during an exchange with the England fast bowler Tymal Mills and Stewart Laudat, who played minor counties cricket for Oxfordshire.

Following their disclosure, Brooks confirmed in a statement that he "deeply regretted" using the term and apologised "wholeheartedly".