A change of pace this week to speak on diversity in cricket. A break in the Second XI Championship fixture list has allowed for us to have a series of matches against the South Asian Cricket Academy — a two-day game that concluded yesterday at Horsham Cricket Club and two T20s scheduled for today.

The SACA is an intervention programme designed to tackle the inequalities highlighted by research regarding the lack of British South Asian representation in professional cricket across Britain. It operates across the South East, South West, Midlands and North of England, as well as recently expanding to Scotland, and serves those with origins from India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bengal.

Anyone who has followed the game over here in the past year or two cannot have escaped the controversy surrounding Yorkshire County Cricket Club and the institutional racism charges laid by former player Azeem Rafiq. It was a case that ultimately involved the British Government and threatened to rock the game to its core, with several players of high profile tainted. Most significant among them was Michael Vaughan, the former Ashes-winning England captain, who was ultimately exonerated.

It is one of those situations where you have to know the truth of what happened at Yorkshire to have a serious or a pretty big opinion on it. I haven’t looked into it in too much depth, to be honest. It’s difficult because it’s “he said against he said”, and “this person said against this person said”. I’ve never commented on it or wanted to comment on it before, and am probably nowhere near qualified to comment or be involved in it. So I’ve stayed clear of situations like that and focused on things going on around me.

The SACA programme is something which I think is pretty powerful for not only the cricketing world, but just the world in general. As we know, the sub-continent produces some serious cricketers, some of the best in the world at any given time. There are some very good cricketers among this group right now.

Obviously, this game is probably not a very good reflection of how good some of them may be, as conditions are quite tricky. And we actually have a pretty strong second team in this game. We’ve got a pretty big squad — bigger after the arrival of Australia’s Steve Smith this week — so guys like George Garton are playing in the second team. But credit to the SACA staff and those behind the programme, which might unearth some serious talents.

These types of matches just test them against good-quality opposition. If they were to get a chance, it is where they will be judged and possibly given a contract. Some of them might have been already involved in counties or been in and around county set-ups, so it’s not too much of an eye-opener. But for some of them, it might be a good eye-opener and be one of those things that gives them that passion and drive to get better.

I am aware that the strategy behind SACA is short to medium-term to support British South Asian players and coaches — male and female — whose career cycles do not allow them to wait for systemic changes in the game. But there is hope that the programme can disband by 2028, when it is expected that changes nationally would render its existence unnecessary.

To achieve its goal of increasing British South Asian representation within the professional game, SACA acts upon research to provide bespoke cricket programmes for squads of male cricketers aged 18 and over. They are trained by top coaches and professionals over winter months, and play fixtures against county second XIs in the summer season.

It is similar in its intent to the African-Caribbean Engagement programme headed up by television commentator Ebony Rainford-Brent, the first Black woman to play for England, which targets inner-city youth. Being a Black athlete, it’s nice to see young guys have the opportunity to be in those professional environments. Sometimes it’s not a case of whether or not they are being picked; it’s just a confidence thing and going into unknown environments. Sometimes you will find that some of the better players in the world or some of the better players in age groups, they’re probably the most shy players and don’t really have much to say — not everyone can be as expressive as a Virat Kohli right off the bat!

It can be difficult for people from different backgrounds and different ethnicities to openly and willingly incorporate themselves into different environments. So, again, to have a programme like Ace is powerful and I think it’s doing very good things. Getting into county cricket has to be the ultimate ambition, and I think they’ve got a few guys who have signed for Surrey from the actual programme. It is one of those things, similar to the South Asian programme, where they’ve had five or six guys signed last year on professional contracts. So it’s nice to see that people are looking at these programmes, taking them very seriously and finding some talent from them.

• Delray Rawlins was talking to Dexter Smith