The independent Cricket Discipline Commission (CDC) sanctioned and suspended Grant Bradburn after he was “charged following allegations of discriminatory conduct" during his time as Glamorgan Cricket Club head coach.
In December 2024, the Cricket Regulator of the ECB Limited had accused Bradburn of three breaches of Regulation 3.3 of the Professional Conduct Regulations 2024. According to the Regulations, “No Participant may conduct themself in a manner, do any act or make any omission at any time which is improper, or which may be prejudicial to the interests of cricket or which may bring the ECB, the game of cricket or any cricketer or group of cricketers into disrepute.” Glamorgan had consequently sacked him following an internal investigation.
According to the allegations, Bradburn “asked players of Asian background what their ‘real age’ is and responded to their answer by saying ‘is that your CricInfo age’ or ‘CricInfo’ or similar”, implying that the age might not be real.
He also asked, for cricket selection decisions in Pakistan, whether “they would pick their friends and cousins or pick their names out of a hat”.
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It was further alleged that during fielding practice sessions, he used the phrases like “this isn’t Western Storm” when he felt that “male players were demonstrating a lack of intensity in their fielding or not throwing hard enough, suggesting that they were ‘throwing like girls’”.
CDC adjudicator Tim O’Gorman issued Bradburn “a reprimand, a caution as to his future conduct, a requirement to attend an appropriate course on discrimination and EDI, and a suspended fine of £500”.
Chris Howard, director of The Cricket Regulator, said: “There is no place for discrimination in cricket and normalisation of discriminatory language through this kind of conduct is unacceptable. Where such instances are identified they will be investigated and those responsible will be held to account.
“The Regulator fully endorses the CDC’s observation that the culture in any organisation is heavily influenced by those who lead that organisation and so it is especially incumbent on all senior leaders to set the right tone. In this instance, Grant Bradburn failed to meet expectations.
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“Glamorgan Cricket acknowledges and welcomes this decision by the Regulator,” said club CEO Dan Cherry in a press release. “We have a zero-tolerance policy towards discriminatory behaviour so as soon as issues were pointed out to us we acted swiftly to protect those affected and show a strong line against poor behaviours that do not reflect the Club’s values.
“We’re confident that the systems and processes we have in place to identify poor behaviour are working by virtue of the fact that those affected felt able to come forward on these points.”
