Khawaja breaks silence on Lord's Long Room incident after MCC release statement on alleged 'abuse', 'physical contact'

A drama-filled final day unfolded at Lord's, where Australia surged to a 2-0 lead in the ongoing Ashes series. However, an unexpected incident off the field managed to gather more attention than Australia's 43-run win. The unpleasant exchange happened after lunch was called and the teams made their way through the prestigious Lord's Long Room. While the players were heading back to the dressing room, two Aussie players were allegedly abused by MCC members that required intervention from the security and an umpire. While MCC later released a statement on the incident, one of those players, Usman Khawaja broke silence on the matter.

In footages that went viral moments after the end of the first session in London on Day 5, Khawaja was seen getting into a heated discussion with a MCC member, who had made his displeasure on Jonny Bairstow's dismissal heard. David Warner too was stopped by the MCC member before a security staff intervened to pull away the two players. Speaking to Channel Nine on the incident, Khawaja described it as "pretty disrespectful".

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"It was really disappointing. Lord's is one of my favourite places to come. There's always respect shown at Lord's, particularly in the Members Pavilion in the Long Room, but there wasn't today. It was very disappointing," Khawaja said.

"If anyone asked me where the best place is to play I always say Lord's. The crowd is great, particularly the members are great, and some of the stuff that was coming out of the members' mouths is really disappointing and I wasn't just going stand by and cop it. So I just talked to a few of them. A few of them throwing out some pretty big allegations and I just called them up on it and they kept going, and I was like, well, this is your membership here. So I'm just pointing them out. But it's pretty disrespectful, to be honest. I just expect a lot better from the members."

Watch the incident below:

Tensions were high at Lord's after Bairstow was dismissed in the rarest of rare fashion. The England batter had walked out of the crease after ducking a short delivery from Cameron Green but Alex Carey immediately threw the ball to take down the stumps. Initially believed to be a run-out, the mode of dismissal was actually 'stumped', indicating that play was pretty much on when it happened. The dismissal was soon followed by loud boos from the fuming English fans who also called the Australian team "cheaters".

Moments after the incident went viral on social media, Cricket Australia released a statement while the Australian team management had reportedly called for an investigation. "It is alleged players and staff from the Australian team were verbally abused, with some being physically contacted, as they made their way to lunch through the members area," Cricket Australia said in a statement.

Later, MCC issued an unreserved apology to the members of the Australia team but revealed that none of them were ejected. "The Long Room is unique in world cricket and the great privilege of players passing through the Pavilion is very special," an MCC spokesperson said. "After this morning's play, emotions were running high, and words were unfortunately exchanged with some of the Australian team, by a small number of Members.

"We have unreservedly apologised to the Australian Team and will deal with any Member who has not maintained the standard we expect through our disciplinary processes. It was not necessary to eject anyone from the ground and I am pleased to say that there was no repeat of this as the players resumed the field for this afternoon's session."