Yorkshire chairman Lord Kamlesh Patel felt a lack of support from the ECB

Yorkshire chair Lord Kamlesh Patel has accused the former leadership of the England and Wales Cricket Board of failing to support him when he faced criticism over the reforms he led at the county.

Lord Patel took over at Yorkshire in November last year after the county had been stripped of hosting rights for international matches over their handling of racism allegations made by former player Azeem Rafiq.

He was tasked by the ECB with implementing governance reforms at Headingley in order to get the county back on track, but faced criticism from the club’s former leadership.

He told the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport select committee he felt he was left totally alone to handle that by the ECB, and that without his previous leadership experience would have walked away.

“If I was attacked in the press or if cricket leaders or previous cricket leaders made unsubstantiated statements, nothing was done,” Patel told MPs.

“I asked in writing, and I have email after email, letter after letter, saying ‘you asked me to do this, I’ve done this, please support me’ and I have no response to any of those letters and emails. So it was very distressing.

“I’m looking forward to the new leadership of Richard Thompson, the few meetings I’ve had with him have been positive and it feels like it’s going forward, but these last 12 months, the answer (to the question of whether he has felt supported by the ECB) has to be ‘no’.”

Patel was asked if the ECB had any understanding of the level of criticism and push-back he was facing.

He added: “If I was an individual who wasn’t a member of the House of Lords and hadn’t had any sort of leadership experience, you would walk away.

“I don’t know how Azeem gets the strength to carry on. You would just run. In the public eye, we get flak (but) this is relentless. And this is from an area where you don’t expect it – this is sport, for God’s sake.

“Individuals who have just been (making) a concerted attack, I do not think people understand, I don’t think the ECB has got it.”

Patel said independent regulation would be good for cricket in an ideal world, but there would be too many years of “navel-gazing” to get there.

However, he described cricket’s existing regulatory process as “completely flawed”.

In June the ECB charged a number of individuals in relation to the allegations from Rafiq, and Yorkshire over their handling of those allegations.

Patel said: “In an ideal world, independent regulator would be excellent. I suppose if I am realistic, the time it would take to put in primary legislation, to set up a system, we’d end up navel-gazing for years.

“But should the CDC (the Cricket Discipline Commission) and the ECB change? Absolutely. Having gone through this process, the regulatory approach that the ECB take, that the CDC (take), is completely flawed.”

Patel also offered some sense of optimism over his work at Headingley, detailing how the club’s pathway has been overhauled in terms of its ethnic and social diversity.

Traditionally the cost of equipment and training has proved prohibitive to some sections of the community, but the make-up is already changing after he opted to abolish all fees.

“In terms of the pathway, two per cent of people coming in through the system in the county age groups were from South Asian backgrounds or diverse backgrounds,” he said.

“We’ve provided free kit, stopped private one to one coaching and introduced a non-biased assessment process.

“We’ve gone from two per cent of people in the system to a third in six months. We’ve managed to make it work, there was a will to do it and it’s expensive. That is going to cost us near on half a million to ensure those children have access to free coaching and kit.”