Harold "Dickie" Bird
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| Dickie Bird | ||||
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 England |
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| Personal information | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Full name | Harold Dennis Bird MBE | |||
| Nickname | Dickie | |||
| Born | 19 April 1933 | |||
| Barnsley, England | ||||
| Height | 5 ft 10 in (1.78 m) | |||
| Role | Batsman, Umpire | |||
| Batting style | Right-hand | |||
| Bowling style | Right-arm off-break | |||
| Domestic team information | ||||
| Years | Team | |||
| 1956–1959 | Leicestershire | |||
| 1956–1959 | Yorkshire | |||
| First-class debut | 16 May 1956: Yorkshire v Scotland | |||
| Last First-class | 12 August 1964: Leicestershire v Essex | |||
| List A debut | 1 May 1963: Leicestershire v Lancashire | |||
| Last List A | 27 May 1964: Leicestershire v Northamptonshire | |||
| Umpiring information | ||||
| Tests umpired | 66 | |||
| ODIs umpired | 69 (1973–1995) | |||
| Career statistics | ||||
| FC | LA | |||
| Matches | 93 | 2 | ||
| Runs scored | 3314 | 9 | ||
| Batting average | 20.71 | 4.50 | ||
| 100s/50s | 2/14 | 0/0 | ||
| Top score | 181* | 7 | ||
| Balls bowled | 48 | 0 | ||
| Wickets | 0 | – | ||
| Bowling average | – | – | ||
| 5 wickets in innings | 0 | – | ||
| 10 wickets in match | 0 | n/a | ||
| Best bowling | – | – | ||
| Catches/stumpings | 28/– | 0/– | ||
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As of 19 August 2007 |
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Harold Dennis Bird, MBE, commonly known as "Dickie" Bird (born in Barnsley, Yorkshire on April 19, 1933) is a retired international cricket umpire. The son of a miner, he gained the nickname 'Dickie' at school. He resides in the South Yorkshire village of Staincross.
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[edit] Playing days
When a knee injury put paid to playing football professionally, he followed his second love, cricket.
In his early career in Barnsley, he played club cricket in the same team as Geoff Boycott, and journalist and chat show host Michael Parkinson, who became a lifelong friend. In 1956, he signed up with his home county, Yorkshire.
Between 1956 and 1964, Bird played first class cricket as a batsman for Yorkshire and Leicestershire in the English County Championship. After his county career, he coached and played league cricket before becoming an umpire.
Little known is the fact that he inaugurated the Sloggers League at Reading University, which is still in existence today.
[edit] Umpiring days
He stood in his first county game in 1970. Three years later he officiated at his first Test match (England v New Zealand at Headingley, Leeds). He gained a reputation for stopping play for weather and not giving batsmen out LBW.
Bird's attention to detail turned nasty at the centenary Test at Lord's in 1980, between England and Australia. Although the Saturday of this particular match had mostly pleasant sunshine, Bird and his fellow umpire, David Constant, refused to let play start because of the previous night's rain; parts of the outfield were still too waterlogged, according to the officials. Angry MCC members scuffled with Constant as he and captains returned to the Long Room after their fifth pitch inspection. The two captains, Ian Botham and Greg Chappell, had to intervene to protect Constant. Bird however was still on the pitch at the time according to his own recounting of the event in his book. When play finally started at 3:45 pm, police had to escort the umpires through the Long Room and on to the field.[1] Thankfully, Bird was never really involved in anything more of this nature for the rest of his Test umpiring career.
One of his strengths was that he was able to manage and earn the respect of some of the more volatile players in the game, sometimes by using his infectious humour. He was also known as being eccentric, famously arriving at a ground five hours early as the Queen was to visit that day.
At the beginning of his sixty-sixth and final Test in 1996, the two teams - India and England - formed a 'guard of honour' as he came out, and he received a standing ovation from the crowd. Bird, an emotional man, was in tears. Two years later, in 1998, he stood in his last county match.
Bird umpired in 66 Test matches (at the time a world record) and 69 One Day Internationals including 3 World Cup Finals.
He came out of retirement to umpire in the XXXX Gold beach cricket which featured England West Indies and Australia which took place at Scarborough beach in Perth Australia
[edit] Celebrity days
Bird went on to write his autobiography simply titled My Autobiography (with a foreword by Michael Parkinson), which Bird claims has sold over a million copies.[2] Bird set up the Dickie Bird Foundation to help disadvantaged under 18s achieve their potential in sport.
He received an MBE from the Queen in 1986 and has also received honorary doctorates from Leeds and Sheffield Hallam Universities. Bird has been given the Freedom of Barnsley.
A six foot statue of Dickie has been erected in Barnsley in his honour.
