Jamie Carragher and Ledley King are the shock call-ups to England's provisional 30-man World Cup squad - but there is no place for Manchester United's Owen Hargreaves.
Neither Carragher nor King has played a game for the Three Lions under Capello, although the Tottenham man was called into the squad for a double header against Slovakia and the Ukraine last year, only to be ditched a couple of days later on fitness grounds.
However, with doubts over Rio Ferdinand and John Terry, and Wes Brown and Joleon Lescott ruled out through injury, Capello has talked Carragher out of retirement and will have a look at the Liverpool man, plus King, who has just played four games in 15 days, before finalising his 23-man squad for South Africa.
Capello has refused to guarantee Jamie Carragher a place in his final squad.
He said: "He is one of the 30 players. During the training camp I will evaluate the performance of each player, after that I will decide."
Detailing how Carragher's return to the international fold came about, Capello added: "We started two months ago, we spoke with him, (Capello's assistant) Franco Baldini met him two weeks ago and he was happy to stay with us and we decided to select him.
"I selected him because he is a really, really good player."
Carragher provided a positive reaction when he was first approached two months ago, and then confirmed his intentions over the past fortnight when it became clear Liverpool were not going to qualify for the Champions League.
"The World Cup and the Champions League are the highest levels of football," said Carragher.
"I am not getting any younger, we have no Champions League next season and I am keen to work under Fabio Capello."
King has also made it into the squad after his form helped Spurs secure a place in next season's Champions League qualifiers.
Capello is convinced that he is worth considering for his final squad despite his long history of injury problems.
"We were monitoring him for a long time," said the Italian.
"He is one of the best defenders in England. In the last 15 days he has played four games, I spoke with him about the knee problems and he said this season the knee was really good.
"The reason I selected him is that he's good, a really good defender."
With Gareth Barry selected, despite ongoing concerns over the ankle injury he suffered during Manchester City's defeat to Tottenham last week, Capello has decided not to call on Hargreaves, as had been predicted even though the midfielder has played only one minute of senior football since October 2008.
Instead, West Ham's Scott Parker is included in a midfield also containing Joe Cole, who has not been involved since the sensational win over Croatia in September 2008.
Manchester City's Adam Johnson is one of two uncapped players in Capello's squad, the other being Tottenham defender Michael Dawson.
Only three goalkeepers - David James, Robert Green and Joe Hart - have been named, whilst attempts to talk Wayne Bridge out of making himself unavailable have been less successful than Capello's efforts with Carragher.
Amongst the players who were mentioned as candidates but did not receive a call were Gary Neville, who was an outside bet anyway, Stewart Downing and Carlton Cole.
In addition, Bobby Zamora has failed to secure a place amongst the final 30 despite his outstanding contribution to Fulham's excellent season.
Instead, Darren Bent has been handed a place despite his ineffective performance against Brazil last November.
Aston Villa boss Martin O'Neill will be disappointed there are no spots for Downing, Gabriel Agbonlahor or Ashley Young, even if Stephen Warnock will travel along with James Milner.
Missing out on this squad does not necessarily end all hope of reaching the World Cup.
Once his final 23-man party is named after the second of two forthcoming friendlies, against Japan in Graz on May 30, Capello can still make changes due to injury and those replacements do not have to come out of the original 30.
Capello has several possible injury headaches with question marks over the fitness of King, Gareth Barry and Wayne Rooney while Owen Hargreaves missed out due to a long-term problem.
He added: "I spoke to Owen twice in Manchester and he's not fit, not ready to play. He didn't play for 18 months and for that reason, I can't select him. He's a really important player when he is fit."
Capello insists there are no injury doubts surrounding captain Rio Ferdinand and confirmed Barry is the only current doubt.
"I am not concerned about these players," he said. "Yesterday I spoke for a long time to Sir Alex Ferguson and he told me Rio is fit, he can play, no problems.
"King is really good, I'm not concerned. We have to wait about the Barry situation but it is only this player."
The Italian coach revealed Bobby Zamora was unlucky to miss out.
"It was one of the last decisions that I took," he revealed.
"I spoke to him and it was up to him because he can't train every day, he plays always with injections and probably he needs an operation (on his Achilles)."
One of Capello's 'wild cards' will be Manchester City winger Adam Johnson.
"He is a really interesting player," said the England chief.
"He played very well in the second part of the season with Manchester City. He's one of the younger players most interesting in the Premier League and I want to check him out during the training camp."
FULL SQUAD:
Goalkeepers: Joe Hart, David James, Robert Green.
Defenders: Leighton Baines, Jamie Carragher, Ashley Cole, Michael Dawson, Rio Ferdinand, Glen Johnson, Ledley King, John Terry, Matthew Upson, Stephen Warnock.
Midfielders: Gareth Barry, Michael Carrick, Joe Cole, Steven Gerrard, Tom Huddlestone, Adam Johnson, Frank Lampard, Aaron Lennon, James Milner, Scott Parker, Theo Walcott, Shaun Wright-Phillips.
Forwards: Darren Bent, Peter Crouch, Jermain Defoe, Emile Heskey, Wayne Rooney.
