It is not the responsibility of elite athletes to fix the issue of racism in sport and the heads of governing bodies must study the true extent of the problem to find solutions, Sport England board member Chris Grant said. 

Professional sportspersons, including Lewis Hamilton and Raheem Sterling, have become leading voices in the anti-racism movement amid protests over the death of George Floyd. 

Manchester City's Sterling has called on English football to address a lack of representation for racial minorities in positions of power to advance the fight against racism. 

"There's something like 500 players in the Premier League and a third of them are black and we have no representation in the hierarchy... or in the coaching staff. There's not a lot of faces that we can relate to and have conversations with," the 25-year-old told BBC. 

Change would only be felt when there was a more diverse mix in the hierarchy of English football, Sterling added. 

"The change is being able to speak to people in Parliament ... clubs across the country, people at the national team of England, to implement change and give equal chances to not just black coaches but also different ethnicities," the England winger said. 

Chris Grant, a senior black administrator in British sport, told the BBC that "I salute Raheem…At the same time, it's not their job to fix this and that's why I have written to the chairs of UK Sport and Sport England asking them to work with other leaders in sport to see the real extent of these problems and to fix them."

"You can't fix the system by dealing with things one at a time. I'm suggesting a commission which will take a historic perspective, will look at the roots of inequalities in sport... and will hear the experiences from grassroots up." 

Meanwhile, the UK Sport chair Katherine Grainger had agreed to discuss the matter. 

"We acknowledge that, sadly, racial inequalities still exist and we're determined to do everything in our power to eradicate it," Grainger told the BBC. 

"Sally Munday (UK Sport chief executive) and I have arranged to meet with Chris to discuss this important issue." 

(With input from agencies)