Dukes owner commits to personally investigate Ashes ball-change controversy

The change of ball in Australia's second innings raised eyebrows as the new ball appeared newer and swung more than its predecessor, which was replaced after striking the helmet of Usman Khawaja in the 37th over

The owner of Dukes has vowed to investigate the replacement ball controversy that occurred during the fifth Ashes Test at The Oval.

The change of ball in Australia's second innings raised eyebrows as the new ball appeared newer and swung more than its predecessor, which was replaced after striking the helmet of Usman Khawaja in 37th over.

Following the change, England claimed 10 wickets on the last day to win by 49 runs and ensure Australia did not achieve a first Ashes series win in England since 2001.

Khawaja said in the post-match presentation that he alerted the umpire to the issue with the ball as he claimed it had hit his bat harder than any ball in the series.

^{There have been claims that the replacement ball in question was four or five years old [Getty Images]}

Meanwhile, former Australia captain Ricky Ponting led the calls for the ball change to be looked into after describing it as "a huge blunder that needs to be investigated".

Dilip Jajodia, the owner of British Cricket Limited which produces the Dukes ball, has confirmed he will do just that.

He told CODE Sports: "I'm going to investigate myself, because it affects me, my name is at stake so it's important they don't mis allege something wrong with the ball."

While there have been claims there was not a broad enough selection of balls made available for the change, Jajodia was quick to point out that was beyond his company's control.

"On this particular occasion, the balls would be done by Surrey," he said. "Surrey get the supply of balls from us before the season starts and then they start knocking them in, getting them into wear and tear, in my view, they're probably not doing it that accurately."

^{Usman Khawaja raised concerns about the ball with the umpires [Getty Images]}

There has been a lot of speculation regarding what ball was picked as the replacement, with CODE Sports reporting that members of the English team believed it may have been a Dukes ball from the 2018 or 2019 batch.

Those were batches that swung a lot more for bowlers. However, Jajodia does not believe that this was the case.

He said: "I can't imagine they would risk putting a ball in there with a different date on it. Frankly the match referee should be on top of it.

"We do bang that number in quite hard, so even if the gold comes off, the ball is imprinted. It wouldn't be easy to get rid of it. I'm not saying it's impossible, but it's not likely."