 Gooch thus took over again as England captain for the tour to West Indies in the winter of 1989 – 90 (he had not played well in the 1989 Ashes, but there was really no other credible candidate as captain, and the West Indies made no objection, having officially ended the "life" bans of their own rebel South Africa tourists after six years) with only a couple of veterans in an otherwise almost new-look team: surprising everybody by winning one Test (their first victory over the Windies since 1974) and drawing another before injury forced him out of the team, his hand being broken by fast bowler Ezra Moseley - ironically, Moseley was the only one of West Indies'rebel tourists to play international cricket after their ban was lifted. Gooch was replaced as captain for the remainder of the series by Allan Lamb (himself South African-born), who lost both of his matches in charge. Gooch went on to captain England the following summer against New Zealand and India at home, remaining in that position almost exclusively until 1993 and bringing England a degree of success that they had not experienced for almost a decade, at least at home: the 1991 home series against the West Indies, in fact, was a hard-fought 2-2 draw, and England reached the World Cup final for the second successive time the following winter (which was much less of a surprise - even when their Test record was at its worst, England were one of the leading one-day sides of the time, often winning the one-day series even when a Test series was lost, including both the otherwise disastrous 1988 and 1989 summers.) For much of this period, he was also rated as one of the world's leading batsmen. Away from home, though, England were not so strong, losing heavily to Australia in 1990-1 and to India and Sri Lanka in 1992-3, though these were either side of a series victory in New Zealand.
