I’m going to investigate myself, because it affects me: Dukes’ owner on ball change controversy at Ashes | Cricket News

As the Ashes ball change controversy rumbles on days after the series ended, Dilip Jajodia, the owner of the Dukes’ ball will launch an internal investigation, as per News Corp.
“I’m going to investigate myself, because it affects me … my name is at stake so it’s important they don’t misallege something wrong with the ball,” he was quoted as saying.
“Every ball we produce for the specific season has got a date stamp on it. It would have 2023 marked on it. We supply balls to the ground. These balls are not controlled the ECB or the ICC, it’s controlled the ground authority. So on this particular occasion (at The Oval) the balls would be done Surrey.
“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 if you like and in my view, they’re probably not doing it that accurately,” he added.
He, however, said that a 2018-19 ball might have found its way into the box that day.
“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 (it was a 2018 or 2019 ball), but it’s not likely,” he said.
Earlier, former Australian skipper Ricky Ponting, also a commentator for the series, called for an investigation because he believed it helped the England bowlers.
Post-match Australian opener Usman Khawaja also said the ball, that was changed in the 37th over of Australia’s chase, was ‘very different’ and ‘hit the bat hard’.
Australia ended Day Four on 135 for no loss in 38 overs but on the fifth and final day lost David Warner in the 42nd over and Usman Khawaja in the 44th during their unsuccessful chase of 384 runs. Warner 60 and Khawaja 72, both victims of fast bowler Chris Wokaes, were Australia’s top scorers in the fourth innings. Marnus Labuschagne departed in the 49th over after he was caught at second slip off a delivery Mark Wood that swung away. England won 49 runs to level the series 2-2 as Australia were bowled out for 334.