You would think most reporters sent to cover such a game might know by now that Moeen is a practising Muslim and therefore appreciate that such a question might be considered pretty crass. As Moeen responded dryly: "I'm not much of a pub guy, to be honest."
But the moment did serve to highlight how the image of the England squad has long since separated from reality.
The reality of this England squad, containing as it does, such clean-cut young men as Alastair Cook, Chris Woakes, Mark Wood (another teetotaller) and Moeen (to name but four of many), is that they arrived in Australia with a single-minded determination to retain the Ashes. You're more likely to see them early in the morning running in the park than drinking in a bar late at night.
The image, however, is of a group of lads on a stag night for whom sessions in the field are a necessary evil in between sessions in the bar.
It's unfair and it's inaccurate. But it's the perception now. And once perceptions are set, they are harder to shift than red wine stains on cricket whites.
It's an image reinforced every time an England player behaves like a fool. Few people can seriously believe Jonny Bairstow or Ben Duckett committed serious indiscretions but, at a time of heightened sensitivity, their actions have provided ammunition for those who want to sustain the narrative that talks of a squad out of control or a team in an alcohol-fuelled crisis.
And it's an image reinforced every time anyone from either set-up is interviewed. The England management, knowing they can't be seen to minimise incidents that, deep down, most of them feel are trivial, inadvertently fan the flames when they talk of "unacceptable" behaviour or impose fines upon players for actions that, if they are honest, they saw every week of their own touring lives. Moeen, with the best of intentions, did the same on Sunday.
Duckett may well need to recalibrate his work-life balance but he is nothing worse than a good-natured halfwit who has been scapegoated by the ECB to show they mean business. A thousand former players - and at least one in the current team - are thinking 'There but for the grace of God...' A more senior, more valuable, player might well have been treated more leniently.
The Australia management, meanwhile, need only sigh and look serious. Darren Lehmann, the Australia coach, played it magnificently over the weekend when, with the gravitas of a weapons inspector, he suggested the Duckett affair was "not funny", thereby passively giving credence to the theory that there is a serious problem at the heart of the England set-up.
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