Australians, inexperienced at one-day cricket, adopted a casual yet aggressive approach, often employing a full slips cordon for their opening bowlers. Gilmour was twelfth man in the early stages of the tournament, but selected for the semi-final against England at Headingley. On a day tailor-made for his style of bowling, he finished with 12 overs, 6 for 14, thus bowling out the opposition for 93. This was the first time that a bowler had taken 6 wickets in an ODI, and remained the best ODI bowling performance until Winston Davis claimed 7–51 in the 1983 competition. With the Australians almost defeated at 39 for 6 in reply, Gilmour thrashed 28 not out off 28 balls to push his team into the final. Although Australia lost the final to West Indies, Gilmour bagged 5–48 and scored 14 off 11 balls. 1975 Ashes Gilmour pressed for selection in the test side with some strong performances in tour games. This included 6 wickets against Kent, and 40 and 46 against Glamorgan. However he was made 12th man for the first two tests, despite scoring 102 in 75 minutes against Sussex. The selectors preferred Max Walker as third paceman. Gilmour was called on only at Headingley, partly because of his World Cup effort there. He replaced Alan Turner. He bagged 6 for 85 in the first innings, three more in the second innings, in a game that was famously called off because protestors vandalised the pitch. Gilmour was dropped for the last Test. 1975–76: career peak Gilmour's best season was in 1975–76. He started well, taking 5–75 and scoring 40 for NSW against Queensland. He followed this with scores of 65 and 75 and three wickets against WA (Kim Hughes's first-class debut). He scored 74 against South Australia and took three wickets for NSW against the touring West Indians. Gilmour was picked in the side for the first test against the West Indies and this time it was Max Walker who was made 12th man. Gilmour took 4–42 and 2–26 helping Australia win the match. Gilmour was kept on in the second test, with Australia opting for five bowlers (playing Gilmour and Walker, hoping Gilmour's batting would offset the loss of a specialist). Gilmour scored 48 (Australia's second highest score in their first innings) and took 2–103 as Australia lost by an innings. In the sole ODI that summer, Gilmour took 2–48. Gilmour was