Ray Illingworth Takes the England Captaincy — A Tactician Takes Command, 1969

England's captaincy had been unsettled since Close was sacked in 1967 (for deliberate time-wasting in a county match). Cowdrey had held the post but his injury created an opportunity for the more prosaic but more tactically astute Illingworth.

Illingworth had been a reliable England all-rounder since the early 1960s — a right-arm off-spinner and useful lower-order batsman who had left Yorkshire for Leicestershire in 1969 after a dispute over his contract. He had never been regarded as a captain candidate; the England hierarchy had preferred the established amateur/professional tradition that favoured Cowdrey and Dexter. But Cowdrey was injured, and Illingworth was available and experienced. He captained England in the second Test against West Indies at Lord's in July 1969 and won it by 30 runs, combining intelligent field placing with aggressive use of the tail-end batting. Cowdrey was not recalled; Illingworth remained captain for the 1969 New Zealand and Pakistan tours, the 1970-71 Ashes and the 1971 India series. His tactical intelligence — he was the most shrewd England captain since Hutton — produced an Ashes victory in Australia in 1970-71 that England had not achieved since 1954-55.