Cricket legend launches £22.5m leisure facility
Tue, 29 Jan 2013 16:24:00 GMT
Former umpire Dickie Bird starts play on the Learning and Leisure Centre
Dickie Bird (centre) is pictured with the University’s Vice-Chancellor, Professor Bob Cryan (left), and Martin Smout, the Chairman and Chief Executive of GB Building Solutions, the main contractor for the project
CRICKET legend Harold ‘Dickie’ Bird OBE is almost 80, but he has lost none of his passion for sport and has made it his mission to encourage and enable young people to play it.
That is why this dedicated Yorkshireman was an ideal choice to preside over the ceremonial ground breaking for a £22.5 million development at the University of Huddersfield, which the ex-umpire is convinced will be a boon to sports of all sorts.
The main contractor for the University’s new Learning and Leisure Centre is GB Building Solutions and facility is due for completion next year.
When he attended the ceremony, Dickie Bird was shown the plans and learned about its a new eight-court sports hall plus the fitness suite, squash courts and other features.
“This will be a fine sports facility, for people not only in Huddersfield but all Yorkshire,” said Dickie. He was especially enthusiastic because he has no doubt about the importance of sport not only for health and fitness but giving young people a new purpose in life.
His own Dickie Bird Foundation provides bursaries that enable under-18s from underprivileged backgrounds to take part in sport.
See highlight's of the ceremony with Dickie Bird in the video below
“We must get them away from street corners and away from watching TV!” he said. “And for that, sport is the finest thing in the world.”
Dickie never ceases to acknowledge the debt that he owes to cricket – he played as a professional for Yorkshire and Leicestershire before turning to umpiring, which made him one of the best-known figures in the game. He officiated at over 66 Test Matches, 92 One-Day Internationals, three World Cup Finals and special matches such as the Centenary Test between England and Australia in 1980.
“If it wasn’t for sport, I’d have been down the pit,” he says. “But cricket gave me the chance to earn a good clean living and to see the world.”
Despite the globetrotting, Dickie has never been remotely tempted to live anywhere but the Barnsley area. “Yorkshire is very special to me and I have never thought about moving away.”
Test cricket is still the ultimate form of the game, says Dickie, but he readily embraces the new form of the game, Twenty20.
“It’s getting youngsters back into the game and it puts fans back in the stand. And when they come away they’ve seen a result, so in many ways Twenty20 is good for the game. But Test Cricket... well for me there is nothing to match it and there never will be.”
