Strange noise

Has anybody else had this?? Today while driving in traffic I decided to quickly overtake a couple of slower cars. I was doing around 35-40 in 5th gear and pulled out and accelerated. Instead of dropping down a couple of gears all I got was a clicking noise like dodgy solenoid. I tried to repeat it again but couldnt until today. Same senario, accelerating from moderate speed and low revs. Any ideas??