[3][4] England won the series 3–0, with wins at Trent Bridge, Lord's and the Riverside Ground; the matches at Old Trafford and The Oval finished as draws.

Despite having played in nine of the last 10 Ashes Tests, seamer Mitchell Johnson was omitted from the squad, as was the highly rated, Pakistan-born leg spinner, Fawad Ahmed, who had not yet received his Australian passport.

[11][12] All-rounder Steve Smith was added to the squad on 23 June after captain Michael Clarke suffered injury concerns,[13] while left-arm orthodox spinner Ashton Agar was called up as back up for Nathan Lyon after taking six wickets for Australia A in three matches against Scotland, Ireland and Gloucestershire.

Middle-order batsman Kevin Pietersen and spinner Graeme Swann were included after overcoming injury troubles from earlier in the year, while Tim Bresnan, Steven Finn and Graham Onions were all selected as competition for the third seam bowling spot alongside James Anderson and Stuart Broad.

[18] After much speculation regarding his replacement,[19][20] Nottinghamshire batsman James Taylor was called up on the back of an unbeaten century against the Australians in a tour match against Sussex, for whom he was making a guest appearance.

[21] The England selectors also made the decision to allow Finn and Onions to return to their clubs, to be replaced by seamer Chris Tremlett and another spin option in Monty Panesar.

† Late addition to squad The first Test was noted as a dramatic match with the advantage swinging between the two sides, culminating in a close result.

England reclaimed the upper hand in the third innings, with Ian Bell's century contributing to a total of 375, setting Australia a target of 311 to win the Test.

[28] However, Australia had a strong showing with the bat and were only 15 runs short of victory by the time the final partnership was broken in the afternoon session of the fifth day.

However England critically managed to avoid the follow-on and consumed much of the time remaining in the game; Australia began the third innings shortly before lunch on the fourth day.

[43] The most high-profile occurred in the first innings of the third Test: Usman Khawaja was given out caught-behind by on-field umpire Tony Hill, and reviewed the decision; Hot Spot showed no sign of an edge, and many observers noted that visual evidence also appeared to show that Khawaja did not edge the ball, but the decision was not overturned.

[44] After the third Test, allegations were made by Australian broadcaster Channel Nine that batsmen were trying to avoid Hot Spot detections by applying silicone tape to their bats.