Cricket: Darren's so wrong but he's no racist

AUSTRALIA and Yorkshire star Darren Lehmann became the first cricketer to be suspended for racist comments yesterday when he was banned from playing for five one-day internationals.

The International Cricket Council punished Lehmann after his racist outburst during a match against Sri Lanka.

ICC match referee Clive Lloyd said Lehmann could have been banned for eight games but received a lesser penalty because of his previous good record and because he had apologised to the Sri Lankans.

Here his brother-in-law, England's Craig White, talks about the devastating effect the ban has had on the player and how he accepts his mistakes. This is not a defence of what Lehman said but an insight into how a gross error of judgment threatens a once spotless reputation.I SPENT yesterday afternoon with my brother-in-law Darren Lehmann at his home in Adelaide and it should have been a happy and memorable family occasion.

A proud father should have celebrating the christening of his one- year-old twins Amy and Ethan.

Instead, on a gorgeous sunny South Australian day, there was a cloud over the Lehmann household.

He had arrived half an hour late, delayed by attending the disciplinary hearing that led to his record five-match one-day international ban that could yet see him miss Australia's opening game in the World Cup.

Where he should have been smiling, he appeared bewildered. Where he should have been talking of his children's future, he appeared distracted by thoughts of his own.

After his dressing room outburst in Brisbane he has been branded a racist. For a cricketer who has to play in the West Indies and on the sub-continent, it is not the sort of baggage you want to carry around on tour.

Not for one moment am I trying to defend the indefensible and Darren knew the second he had said it and had been overheard that he was totally in the wrong.

That is why he went straight to the Sri Lanka dressing room after the game and apologised individually to each of their players and wrote a letter to their management reinforcing his regret.

The matter did not end there, though. The story leaked out, the International Cricket Council was clearly appalled and he had to face his appointment with match referee Clive Lloyd. For any international player missing five games is a hardship - especially to an Australian with so much competition for places in their side. But that is nothing compared to the task he faces trying to clear his reputation.

A task not made easier by the International Cricket Council rules which do not allow a player to comment on disciplinary hearings. In many such cases there is no need - a player is caught showing dissent on camera and it is an open and shut case.

Racism, however, is much more complicated. But I can state categorically that, having known Darren for 15 years and become part of the same family, there is not an ounce of racism in his blood.

I am sure the words he used, all alone in the confines of the dressing room, were the words of a cricketer frustrated at getting out.

He was letting off the steam, getting rid of the adrenalin that pumps players up out in the middle, before he calmed down to analyse his performance. We all have our own way of doing it and the words or actions we use have no deeper meaning.

Day in and day out what happens in cricket dressing rooms - and in rugby and football ones too - stays in the dressing room. But for Darren the consequences could be horrendous.

Australia are due in the Caribbean for a Test tour in April and May. He wants to be a part of that tour but is worried this incident will return to haunt him at every turn.

If he goes to the West Indies the chances are he may not return to play for Yorkshire this summer. But if he does turn up at Headingley, where he has been captain for the past two years, the situation could be just as awkward.

It has been well documented that the county has suffered problems with racism on the terraces in the past and has worked hard to eradicate it.

The last thing Darren would want is to be associated with those who judge people by the colour of their skins. And I am sure if Yorkshire want him to make a public statement to that effect he will jump at the chance.

They could even ask the Sri Lankans to support him - after all, their coach Dav Whatmore is reported to have spoken out on Darren's behalf at the hearing and he is grateful for that.

To us players the five-match ban, the biggest handed out in the game's history for any offence apart from match-fixing, is a clear signal that the ICC intends to follow through the statement issued during the Melbourne Test that player behaviour has to improve.

No one can have any qualms with that as long as it applies to every Test-playing country.

I have been a victim of racist remarks. Some have stemmed not only from being born in Yorkshire but raised in Australia, others have referred to the colour of my skin.

On the sub-continent a couple of winters it got so bad I mentioned it to the England management and action was taken.

The Lehmann case, as it is bound to become known, has now brought the issue out into open. And provided he is not just a scapegoat and the authorities are going to crackdown worldwide some good may come out of it.

On a happier note for the family it seems my chances of playing in the World Cup are getting better by the week. I have now got until our first warm-up game in Port Elizabeth on February 4 to recover from my rib injury.

That's a fortnight longer than England's management originally gave me and since time is the best healer for this kind of muscle problem I am now much more confident of taking my place in the squad.

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