"It probably had some of the Australian players, coaches, and the captain at different times scratching their heads" - Ricky Ponting on Bazball 

Former Australia captain Ricky Ponting feels that England's aggressive approach rendered the Aussies clueless at times during the Ashes. The five-match series in England ended 2-2, with Australia managing to retain the urn by virtue of entering the contest as the holders.

England were vocal about maintaining the unorthodox approach that has brought them a lot of success in recent times, and they were true to their words. The Ben Stokes-led side took on the Australian bowling unit and almost pulled off a comeback after being 0-2 down in the series at one point.

Ponting admitted that English batters were successful in their attempt to dominate the Australian bowling unit.

"The two contrasting styles of play were great to sit back and watch. "There was a lot of talk about Bazball and how England would approach it, and would that style stand up against the quality of the Australian attack - looking back, it probably did," he said on SEN Tassie breakfast show.

"It probably had some of the Australian players, coaches, and the captain at different times scratching their heads as to how they were going to combat it. Think the 2-2 result, albeit probably slightly biased with a bit of controversy in that last Test with the ball changed the way that it was, gifted England some conditions they probably shouldn't have got, think the level of cricket played across the series, the 2-2 result was probably fair," Ponting continued.

The series has been hailed as a modern-ear classic with all five Tests going into the final day with all three results quite possible. While England could not regain the Ashes, Australia lost the golden opportunity to win a series on English soil for the first time since 2001.

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"Zak Crawley has got to take a lot of credit" - Ricky Ponting

Zak Crawley finished the series as England's leading run-scorer and the second-highest overall. The opening batter made a massive statement by hitting a boundary off the very first ball of the series and scored a brilliant hundred in the fourth Test at Old Trafford, Manchester as well.

Crediting the England top-order batters, particularly Crawley, Ponting said:

"It was more their top-order batting, I think, [that] we struggled to come to grips with. The way that Crawley and Duckett were able to play at the start of every innings, really, they got England off to flying starts and put pressure straight back on the Australian attack. When that momentum started to build it was hard for the Australians to rein it back in."

"Zak Crawley has got to take a lot of credit, he was the one going into the series who was under the most pressure. That 180 he got at Manchester was as good a Test match batting as you could see…as I said it had [Pat Cummins] and the boys scratching their heads as to how they were going to bowl at him," he added.

The two teams began the 2023-25 World Test Championship with the Ashes series. While they won the same number of games, Australia are placed higher than England in the points table due to the slow over-rate penalties that have been applied.