“I didn’t support Australia for a long time, up until I was 13 or 14,” says Usman Khawaja. “I just could not relate to the Australian cricket team.”
“Did you grow up supporting the Australian cricket team?” asks Usman Khawaja, before nodding his head in understanding when I, a fellow Pakistani-born Australian, admitted that I didn’t.
It’s one of the sad ironies of cricket in Australia: Australians from South Asian backgrounds are one of the : Usman Khawaja. Only two Indigenous men have ever played Test cricket for Australia: Jason Gillespie and Scott Boland. More than 460 men have played Test cricket for Australia, just a touch under 99 percent of them have been white.Credit:It’s an embarrassing record that helps explain why even now, nearly two decades after Khawaja started to shrug off his distaste of the Australian team, many younger Australians from South Asian backgrounds still can’t get behind the Baggy Green.
These stories, as depressing as they are, can be strangely vindicating for those who’ve experienced the same thing. If even an Australian Test batter is being racially profiled while doing his job, maybe we’re not imagining it when we feel judged or treated differently in our workplaces, in social settings or even on the street.
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