Dean Headley: Stop giving racism oxygen of publicity

Racism is fortunately less of an issue with cricket than football crowds these days; such distressing incidents as the abuse of Jofra Archer in New Zealand in November are less frequent than the monkey chanting, banana throwing and audible obscenities heard on pitches from north London to eastern Europe.

Dean Headley, the former England fast bowler, has some interesting views on the methods needed to try to eradicate the problem, though.

Headley, 50, is a big West Bromwich Albion fan and was a season-ticket holder in the late 1970s. “Dad (Worcestershire batsman Ron) knew Cyrille Regis, Laurie Cunningham and Brendan Batson, ‘The Three Degrees’ as they were called.

“There weren’t many black footballers then. Watch First Among Equals – the story of Laurie Cunningham on YouTube to understand what it was like back then. It’s brilliant. There would be 30,000 in the ground, and 20,000 would be shouting ‘shoot that n*****’. Now that is a racial problem.

“What I don’t like is giving racism a platform. So for instance when five people out of a crowd of 60,000 at Tottenham are alleged (in December) to have started doing monkey noises (in the match against Chelsea) then I don’t think you should be publicising it, talking about it – you should just get them, punish them, ban them from football and be done with it.

“That story lasted for two weeks in the media and papers. As much as you’re opening it out, you’re also opening it out to idiots who crave the notoriety. In a way we create racism by talking about it so much. 

“Yes there are countries that have a much worse problem than us, going back to what it was like here in the 1970s. If we think that we are going to wipe out racism, there’s always going to be people who are uneducated. But I don’t think the way to do it is talk about it on television. All you are going to do is stir up more people who may be racist.”

Headley’s grandfather, the legendary George, ‘the Black Bradman’, moved to Lancashire in the 1930s; Dean himself grew up in the west Midlands.

^{An Auckland man, 28, has been banned from attending matches until 2022 after abusing Archer}

“I wasn’t as badly abused as Cyrille. I had boys drive past me and call me names. I was taught to deal with it in a different way – not to ignore it, but not to react to it. 

“It’s just phases that people go through in their lives. People look at how political kids get when they are young. There’s a lot of people at 13 who are with older people teaching them bad things and when they get older they realise they were wrong.

“I had friends who come to me and tell me that they know they were an idiot when we were kids. One of them is a best friend of mine, but for four or five years to me he was not very nice.

“My mum brought me up saying ‘sticks and stones may break my bones, but names can’t hurt me’. I wouldn’t walk off the pitch if stadiums started making monkey noises. But that’s me, that’s the way I was brought up. I’d say, it’s not right but I am not going to back down.

“The one thing I would do at sports grounds is stop abusive language. Because if you stop swearing you can’t abuse anybody. What are they going to do, shout out ‘black’ or ‘gay’? Because they are not harmful words in themselves. You get in trouble for calling somebody a black c***. The word ‘black’ isn’t the problem.

“People want the world to be so perfect, but it cannot be perfect. But it’s pretty good. Better than it was.

“My grandfather came over in the 1930s to play in the northern leagues. It was different, because a lot of the tensions in the 1970s were to do with jobs. People are now getting tetchy about the Polish. George had it differently. He was walking down the road and he was wearing a proper hat as the West Indians did back then. This little boy pointed at him and said, ‘Who’s that black man?’ And the mum said ‘That’s not a black man, that’s Mr Headley’. They were different times.”

An Auckland man, 28, has been banned from attending matches until 2022 after abusing Archer. And the fast bowler has also revealed how he is racially abused on social media.

Not everyone will agree with Headley’s views, but they are a thoughtful contribution to the debate.

For the complete interview with Dean Headley on his county and England days, and life after cricket, buy the forthcoming June issue of The Cricketer, out on May 22.

Save 30% when you subscribe to The Cricketer’s print & digital bundle. £35 for 12 issues