The Cricket Regulator has charged Middlesex County Cricket Club with misconduct — the third such charge against the London-based club in four years.

The charge, announced on 31 July 2026, relates to the alleged behaviour of former chief executive Andrew Cornish towards another Middlesex employee. That employee filed a formal complaint in November 2025. The Cricket Disciplinary Panel (CDP), the independent body that hears disciplinary cases in English cricket, has already upheld the complaint against Cornish himself. Middlesex dismissed Cornish in June 2026. He denies any wrongdoing and is reportedly considering legal options, including a wrongful dismissal claim against the club.

Under England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) regulations, both the club and the accused individual are held liable in misconduct cases. That means Middlesex faces the disciplinary process even though Cornish himself has already been found in breach. The Regulator will take the case before a three-person independent panel appointed by the CDP. The panel has yet to confirm any punishment. If the complaint against the club is upheld, any sanction is likely to be financial rather than sporting — a fine rather than a points deduction, in other words.

Both Middlesex and the ECB declined to comment, The Guardian reported. The Cricket Regulator's own press release confirms the charge is for a breach of ECB Directive 3.3, which covers conduct deemed improper, prejudicial to the interests of cricket, or that brings the game into disrepute.

This is not an isolated episode for Middlesex. In September 2023, the club was handed a suspended points deduction and a £150,000 fine — £100,000 of which was suspended — for breaching financial regulations, including misuse of central funding. That suspended element was lifted in October 2025. In June 2024, the Regulator charged the club with improper conduct following complaints about another senior employee, though the CDP did not uphold that charge. Separately, former Middlesex CEO Richard Goatley lodged a personal injury claim against the club in April 2024, alleging a campaign of harassment.

The Cricket Regulator itself was established in December 2023 in the aftermath of the Azeem Rafiq racism scandal, which exposed deep-rooted problems in the English game and prompted the ECB to create an independent body to run its disciplinary system. The Regulator's job is to investigate and charge; the CDP, a separate panel, then hears the case and decides on sanctions.

For Middlesex, the charge compounds a difficult period off the pitch. One of English cricket's oldest counties — they play at Lord's, the sport's most famous ground — the club has now faced three formal misconduct proceedings since 2023, even if one was not upheld. The pattern is hard to ignore, even if each case involves different individuals and circumstances.

What happens next depends on the independent panel. A hearing date has not been publicly confirmed. Cornish's potential legal action against Middlesex adds another layer: if he proceeds with a wrongful dismissal claim, the club could find itself defending its handling of the original complaint in an employment tribunal as well as before cricket's disciplinary body.