The England and Wales Cricket Board is looking into claims a second England player posted “historic offensive material”, just a day after the governing body suspended seamer Ollie Robinson for past racist and sexist tweets.
Wisden.com has unearthed and published a tweet of a racist nature but concealed the alleged England cricketer’s identity because he was under the age of 16 at the time.
“It has been brought to our attention that an England player has posted historic offensive material on their social media account,” the ECB said in a statement.
“We are looking into it and will make a further comment in due course.”
Earlier on Monday, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson agreed with Culture Secretary Oliver Dowden’s assessment that the suspension of Robinson from all international cricket pending an investigation was “over the top”. Robinson, 27, issued an apology for social media posts he wrote in 2012 and 2013, when he was in his late teens, that came to light and were shared online on the day he made his Test debut against New Zealand at Lord’s last week.
He has been suspended pending a disciplinary investigation by the ECB, which drew a rebuke from Secretary of State Dowden, who waded into the matter on Monday.
While Dowden acknowledged Robinson’s tweets were “offensive and wrong”, he added they “are also a decade old and written by a teenager”.
Mr Dowden said: “The teenager is now a man and has rightly apologised. The ECB has gone over the top by suspending him and should think again.”
A spokesperson for the Prime Minister said: “As Oliver Dowden set out, these were comments made more than a decade ago, written by someone as a teenager, and for which they have rightly apologised.”
The ECB declined to comment when asked about Dowden’s remarks.
Robinson, who said he was “embarrassed” and “ashamed” of his past tweets, has been stood down from the second and final Test against New Zealand at Edgbaston, which gets under way on Thursday.
Meanwhile, England have been fined 40 per cent of their match fees after they were found to be two overs behind the over rate in the first Test.
