Moeen Ali accuses Aussie international of racially abusing him

England all-rounder Moeen Ali has accused an Australian cricketer of racially abusing him during the first Test of the 2015 Ashes at the Sophia Gardens in Cardiff. In his autobiography,  Moeen mentioned that one of the Australian fielders referred to him as Osama, referring to the founder of Al-Qaeda, Osama bin Laden, who was killed by the US military forces in Pakistan in 2011.

He also added that he mentioned about this incident to coach Trevor Bayliss, who took the issue straight away to his Australian counterpart Darren Lehmann. When Lehmann asked the concerned player about this, he denied it and admitted that he called him a part-timer though.

'It was a great first Ashes Test in terms of my personal performance. However, there was one incident which had distracted me. An Australian player had turned to me on the field and said, 'Take that, Osama.' I could not believe what I had heard. I remember going really red.

'I have never been so angry on a cricket field. I told a couple of the guys what the player had said to me and I think Trevor Bayliss [the England coach] must have raised it with Darren Lehmann, the Australians' coach. Lehmann asked the player, 'Did you call Moeen Osama?' He denied it, saying, 'No, I said, 'Take that, you part-timer.''

'I must say I was amused when I heard that, obviously I had to take the player's word for it, though for the rest of the match I was angry,' he wrote in his autobiography.

That match saw Moeen putting on one of his finest Test performances in Tests as he scored a crucial 77 batting at number 8 and with the ball, he picked up five wickets and helped his team beat their arch-rivals by 169 runs and take a 1-0 lead in the five-match series.

Responding to Moeen's allegations, Cricket Australia (CA) have confirmed that they are setting up investigations into the matter as remarks of this nature are unacceptable and have no place in both the sport and society.