Courtesy-Hindustan Times, ESPNcricinfo.com
Michael Holding, a retired Jamaican fast bowler, believes Ollie Robinson should not be harshly penalized for his prior racist and sexist comments if an inquiry shows he has improved his behavior since then.
Robinson has been pulled out of England’s second test against New Zealand, which begins on Thursday at Edgbaston, after historic tweets surfaced last week when he made his test debut at Lord’s. Holding stated on Tuesday that the ECB had adopted the correct course of action.
“[It was] maybe eight or nine years ago. Can the ECB please find out if Robinson has continued to behave like that, say things like that, tweet things like that after that time,” Holding said.
“Because I was a young guy once, I did a lot of stupid things as a kid, and as you get older, you realize, ‘Oh, maybe what I did at 18 doesn’t apply anymore, I can’t behave like that now,” Robinson remarked.
If he did something like that nine years ago and since then he has learned and has done nothing like that and has changed his ways, Holding does not believe things should be too hard on him.
“Yes, suspend him because you want to investigate. You don’t allow him to continue playing, like on Thursday, while an investigation is going on at the same time, because if you find out things that are horrible coming out in that investigation. But do it quickly, let’s get it over with quickly.”
England players have accepted Ollie Robinson’s apology for racist and sexist statements he made on social media as a youngster, according to fast bowler James Anderson. Anderson, England’s all-time leading wicket-taker, told reporters that the 27-year-old fast bowler had apologized “unreservedly” in the dressing room for the 2012-13 tweets.
According to reports, the ECB is now looking into a second England cricketer for prior “offensive” social media statements.