Mike Denness, England's captain for the first ever World Cup in 1975, recalls the success of the tournament.

I recall the summer of 1975 instantly not because we failed to regain the Ashes but for the tremendous success of the inaugural World Cup, which was played in England during weeks of glorious sunshine. I was in the privileged position of being the England captain for this prodigious tournament, and although we had just returned from five months Down Under where we received a painful 4-1 beating from the Aussies, we did leave New Zealand having won the two-Test series 1-0, so our minds and thoughts were focused entirely on the World Cup.

With home advantage, the aspiration of at least reaching the Final was high in my expectations, and I was even more confident once it transpired that England would not be in the same group as West Indies or Australia. With the format comprising the six full-member Test countries, plus East Africa and Sri Lanka, divided into two groups England's target was to finish top and earn a semi-final against the runner-up of the other group.

The week leading up to the start of the World Cup was not the most ideal preparation. I was playing in my final match for Kent against Essex at Colchester five days before joining the England team for our opening match against India at Lord's on June 7. On the second day of the match the umpires called a halt in play as sleet was falling very heavily. As I walked off the field with my Kent colleague Asif Iqbal, who would captain Pakistan during the World Cup, his facial expressions of disbelief were a picture. He was seeing snow for the very first time.

With the World Cup only five days off I worried what a disaster it could all be, and my fears grew next day when a newspaper printed a photograph of the Buxton ground where Derbyshire were playing Lancashire, showing the entire ground covered in snow. Nevertheless, the World Cup began in brilliant sunshine.

England's three group matches against India, New Zealand and East Africa were all won comfortably and I was delighted with our overall play. Our opening game at Lord's against India, however, provided a puzzling situation. India never at any stage offered any challenge to our score of 334 for 4, while Sunil Gavaskar batted throughout the 60 overs for 36 not out – astonishing from a player of his class and calibre. Giving the appearance of just wanting a net practice, he never once looked to attack our bowling, and a capacity crowd was surely disappointed. After the game I learned that there had been a disagreement in the Indian dressing-room over the team chosen to play us which may have prompted Gavaskar's actions.

Our confidence was growing, we were top of our group and a semi-final match against Australia awaited at Headingley, where 10 days previously Australia had played Pakistan on a good pitch which produced almost 500 runs. Hopes were high that a similar pitch would be prepared for our encounter, but as it turned out the same one was used and this time it was damp and green. What a disappointment for such a crucial match.

Put in by Australia, we expected the ball to swing and seam around in the heavy atmosphere, but what we didn't envisage was that Gary Gilmour would make it seam around so prodigiously as well as generating natural swing. We were bowled out for 93, but our quality seam attack of Arnold, Snow, Old and Peter Lever had Australia reeling at 39 for 6. The tension was high, the atmosphere electric and an England win was more than a possibility. Alas, we dropped Gilmour at a very critical time and he and Doug Walters rode their luck and took Australia through to victory.

The World Cup was all over for England. The players were extremely despondent and the atmosphere in the dressing-room afterwards was very low. Setting off down the motorway from Headingley en route to the garden of England, Alan Knott and I were reflecting on what might have been when a police car overtook us and, with lights blazing, pulled us over. Was this going to be the final episode to a truly disappointing day? As the police officer approached my car, I wound down the window, whereupon he said: 'I thought it was you two. Eeh lads, what on earth went wrong at Headingley today?'