Prince hurts ECB's case

Ashwell Prince has badly damaged the England and Wales Cricket Board's case against Andrew Gale by admitting he did not consider the Yorkshire captain's abusive sledging to be racist.

Prince broke his silence on the issue on a radio interview, during which he said he was offended by Gale's comments but at the time did not think they were racist.

His comments are expected to add weight to Yorkshire's contention that this case is being pursued by the ECB alone, and not because of any genuine sense of grievance felt by Lancashire or Prince.

"I took offence at the way he spoke to me. To be quite honest, I didn't stand there and think that might be a racial slur," Prince told Balls Radio.

"The guy walked towards me and had a go and I defended myself. The ECB feel it has racial connotations and it's up to them to do whatever they want to do."

Gale told Prince to "f*** off back to your own country" and called him a "Kolpak f*****".

He was charged with a level two offence under the ECB's code of conduct by the two umpires standing in the match and immediately banned for two games.

But the charge was later escalated by the ECB's cricket discipline commission to a level three or four offence, with Gale being accused of using racist and abusive language. Yorkshire have engaged a legal team to defend Gale and will feel confident of securing a not guilty verdict, given the object of the abuse has said he did not take the comments to be racist.

Prince denied provoking the incident, which occurred during the Roses match, but did admit he was wasting time.

"I didn't say anything. I stood in the middle of the pitch as it was coming to cut-off time, they were bowling two spinners and wanted to bowl as many overs as possible," he said.

"Obviously, being the experienced player that I am, I was in the middle of the pitch tying up my thigh pad and taking as long as possible to make sure there would only be one more over.

"He's taken offence to this - it's a time-wasting ploy and I'll admit to that. But everyone who has ever played the game has done it; it's nothing new.

"But then he's come from backward point to silly point, walking in my direction, and hurling a whole lot of abuse at me.

"Those who know me and those who have played against me know that I will not tolerate that. I defended myself and whatever was said, was said."