5 captains who lost their job because of an Ashes failure

2 Bill Lawry

He might be better known for his exuberant commentary nowadays, but Bill Lawry was an excellent defensive opening batsman for Australia in the 1960s and captained the national team for around three years.

Lawry was a fine batsman and led Australia with distinction in his very first Ashes series in England back in 1968. Australia drew the series 1-1 and regained the Ashes. However, in the series that took place in Australia in 1970-71, his captaincy unravelled spectacularly as a John Snow-inspired England condemned the hosts to a 2-0 defeat.

Lawry came in for heavy criticism from many quarters for his defensive captaincy and it was only a matter of time before the inevitable happened. He was dropped from the side following the sixth Test of the seven match series and never played for Australia again.

He remains the only Australian captain to have been sacked during a Test series.