A powerful batsman, Gooch reached his peak as England captain with scores of 333 and 123 (a record Test match aggregate) against India at Lord’s in 1990. That year he also became the first player to score over 1000 Test runs in an English summer (306 v New Zealand, 752 at 125.33 v India). He became only the fifth player ever to average over 100 in an English first class season, as his 2746 runs at 101.70 was the highest since 1961.
He made his Test debut in 1975 but had to wait until 1978 for a second chance, from when he established himself as an England regular, except for a three-year ban after he had captained an English ‘rebel’ tour to South Africa in 1982. After captaining England twice in 1988, he returned to the job in 1990 and led the team by the personal example of his magnificent batting, although often it seemed with not great tactical acumen. He resigned after England lost four of the first five Tests of the Ashes series in 1993, with an overall Test record of 10 wins in his 34 matches as captain. He did, however continue to bat marvellously well in that series, with 673 runs at 56.08 in the six Tests. He announced his retirement from Test cricket during the 1994/5 series against Australia.
He has played for Essex from 1973, captaining them in 1986-7 and 1989-94. With them, he has won six county championships (1979, 1983-4, 1986, 1991-2) as well as the Sunday League in 1984 and 1985. He holds the runs record for all three English one-day competitions: 7906 in the Sunday League, including the record score of 176 in 1983; 2383 in the Gillette/NatWest Cup and 4934 (to end 1995) in the Benson & Hedges Cup; including the record score of 198 in 1982. In 1994, when he exceeded 1000 runs in a season for the 19th time (five over 2000), he passed 40,000 runs in first class cricket, including 12 double centuries. He is also a useful medium-pace swing bowler. He was awarded the OBE in 1991.
118 Tests 1975-95; 8900 runs at 42.53, 20 100s HS 333; 23 wickets at 46.47, BB 3-39, 103 catches.
120 One-day Ints 1976-95: 4290 runs at 36.98, 8 100s HS 142; 36 wickets at 42.11, BB -19; 45 catches.
First Class 1973-95; 40, 859 runs at 48.93, 113 100s HS 333; 238 wickets at 34.81, BB 7-14; 513 catches.
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