Rainford-Brent was the first black player to play for the England women’s cricket team
Former England cricketer Ebony Rainford-Brent has shared an image of a racist letter she was sent in which she was told to ‘leave our country.’
The Sky Sports pundit, who was the first black player to play for the England women’s team, shared the letter on her Twitter account which detailed horrifying racial slurs and abuse.
Rainford-Brent, who was born in England, captioned her tweet with: “Interesting… Born in south London but apparently I was found naked in Africa as a primitive. Had some letters in my time but this one up there!”
The letter also told her to ‘leave our country’ and to ‘Go! Go Today!”
Interesting…🤔 Born in South London but apparently I was found naked in Africa as a primitive 😂 Had some letters in my time but this one up there! pic.twitter.com/Z4QhATia1B
— Ebony-Jewel Rainford-Brent MBE (@ejrainfordbrent) November 17, 2021
The letter was posted to social media on Wednesday (17 November) just a day after Azeem Rafiq provided evidence in parliament about the racial abuse he suffered during his time at Yorkshire CCC.
In the aftermath of the meeting in front of the Digital, Media, Culture and Sport select committee, Rafiq predicted that the ‘floodgates’ would open after his testimony.
An English Cricket Board hotline – which had been directly set up as a result of Rafiq’s accounts had received over 1000 complaints of discrimination in the last week, with more expected to speak out too.
Rainford-Brent was awarded the freedom of the city of London alongside the now-retired colleague Michael Holding last year for their role in a powerful video which discussed the Black Lives Matter movement.
During the film, the former cricketer – who made 29 appearances for England between 2001 and 2010 discussed how comments made about her ethnicity made her question her future in the game.
The 37-year-old has been a pioneer in promoting diversity and culture in the sport, setting up the organisation ACE – a charity which looks at increasing the opportunities in cricket for people of the African-Caribbean community.
Related links:
- Somerset make Jack Brooks take diversity training after investigation into old tweets
- Azeem Rafiq calls for the BBC to take action against Michael Vaughan
- Cricket needs a Kick It Out-style organisation to tackle racism, says Julian Knight MP
