John Stephenson: Essex chief 'disappointed' to receive no warning over potential ECB sanctions

John Stephenson took over as Essex chief executive in late 2021

Essex chief executive John Stephenson says he is "disappointed" the club received no warning they were to face potential sanctions from the England and Wales Cricket Board for falling short on board diversity targets.

On Tuesday the county were placed under a "non-compliance process" by the ECB.

The ECB said Essex "do not yet have a clear action plan to deliver change."

"There's a great opportunity to meet our targets very quickly, but I am determined to do it properly," he said.

Speaking to BBC Essex, Stephenson continued: "When they issued their statement I was surprised because yesterday afternoon, without any warning, they singled out Essex in terms that we haven't reached our diversity targets with our board.

"That's disappointing because I've been working very closely with the ECB in this process during the last six or seven months."

Sanctions may be considered against Essex if "sufficient progress is not made" within agreed deadlines, however, 80% of county organisations (40 out of 50 entities) have met their board diversity targets.

The ECB had set out a target of at least 30% female and locally representative ethnicity on boards by the end of April 2022.

Stephenson said that the county was awaiting an independent report into its conduct before making changes to its board ahead of an AGM, which may not take place until mid to late August.

Asked by BBC Essex whether the ECB was aware of the timescale for the club to hold an AGM, Stephenson said: "They are fully aware of that.

"I have spoken to the ECB a lot about the process we're going through to address the board, the diversity and the process. It's just when that statement came out yesterday that prompted those news articles, we were caught unaware and we weren't ready for that."

Stephenson said that there had been "quite a few" expressions of interest to join its board and the potential candidates do not necessarily have to be current members of the club.

"It makes me angry because every couple of weeks there's a new story coming out about Essex and perception wise it's not great for us when stories keep coming out about historical allegations of racist behaviour at the club, because it doesn't reflect where we are now," he added.

"That's what's incredibly frustrating. But we're going to have to deal with it and face it head on, which we've tried to do over the past few months and learn from everything that's happened and ensure it never happens again."