By Malcolm Conn and Daniel Brettig
Fresh video has emerged showing how Usman Khawaja was repeatedly singled out for abuse by some members in the Long Room at Lord’s on Sunday, as the whole Australian team was booed, heckled and jostled during the lunch break of the second Ashes Test.
While it is unclear from the video what was said to Khawaja, who is of Pakistani heritage, it was enough to have him stop and ensure an official took the member’s name. Sources close to the England Cricket Board, speaking on condition of anonymity because the process is ongoing, deny that the investigations under way by the Marylebone Cricket Club relate to racial abuse. The MCC has been contacted for comment.
The video, taken on a mobile phone and sent to this masthead, is shot from a different angle than the footage that has been circulating of the Australian players being booed and abused climbing the stairs to the dining room.
It shows Khawaja stopping and pointing out a member to MCC stewards and the team’s security manager, Frank Dimasi. This took place after broadcast footage showed Khawaja stopping in the Long Room and pointing a member out to MCC security before David Warner joined the discussion.
Witnesses who were spoken to by this masthead on the condition of anonymity said they were “disgusted” and “shocked” by some of the language directed at all the Australian players in the Long Room, and to Khawaja in particular. The Lord’s Test week had begun with the release of a damning report around discrimination and entitlement within the English game.
“Some of the stuff that was coming out of the members’ mouths was really disappointing, and I wasn’t just going to stand by and cop it,” Khawaja said after Australia won the Test by 43 runs.
Usman Khawaja spoke with security as he climbed the stairs.
“So I just talked to a few of them, a few of them [were] throwing out some pretty big allegations and I just called them up on it, and they kept going. And if they kept going I was like, ‘Well, it’s your membership here’, so I was just pointing them out. But it’s pretty disrespectful, to be honest. I just expect a lot better from the members.”
The usually docile Lord’s erupted on Sunday when Jonny Bairstow was stumped by Alex Carey after walking out of his crease as he believed over had been called and the ball was dead.
The Australians were constantly booed and there were chants of “cheat”, behaviour that was repeated in the Long Room when the players left the ground for lunch. Lord’s is the only Test venue in the world where players walk past members indoors as they enter and leave the ground.
The investigation into the Long Room incident is being aided by other MCC members appalled by the behaviour of some colleagues. Some have provided witness statements to the club.
Three members have already been suspended pending further inquiries and more may follow.
England coach Brendon McCullum further inflamed the situation by doubling down with his criticism of Australia in the UK media on Monday.
“I imagine it will affect it [the spirit of series], I think it has to,” McCullum said. “In the end, they made a play, they’ve got to live with that, we would have made a different play but that’s life. From our point of view, we believe that we can still come back in this series, and that’s where our focus has got to be.”
McCullum has been forced to defend similar dismissals when he was New Zealand wicketkeeper and later captain a decade ago.
Protagonist Stuart Broad also weighed in with his column in the Daily Mail.
“What amazed me, and what I told the Australians I could not believe as we left the field for lunch, was that not one senior player among them ... questioned what they had done.”
Cricket officials are preparing for the possibility that animosity towards the Australians for running out Bairstow after he walked out of his crease on the final day may boil over on his home ground of Headingley, which always has a raucous crowd. The third Test starts on Thursday, with England already 0-2 down in the five-match series.
Security has been increased to not only ensure the players’ safety but also prevent a repeat of Just Stop Oil protesters charging onto the ground at Lord’s after the first over of the match and reaching players, who protected the pitch. While one protester was eventually tackled by security, Bairstow carried the other 60 metres to the boundary before handing them over to security.
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