19 September 1998
Talking Cricket
By Matthew Fleming
ON Tuesday the Professional Cricketers' Association held their
annual awards dinner at Lord's. It was attended by HRH The Duke
of York, nearly 700 players, sponsors and guests, and was a
fitting celebration of a memorable summer's cricket.
The main awards, the PCA Player and Young Player of the Year, won
by Mal Loye and Freddie Flintoff respectively, have been well
documented.
There was, however, one award made by the PCA that received
little or no publicity, and as chairman it was my privilege to be
able to present it.
This year the PCA Special Merit award took on a new meaning as it
was presented to a man outside the immediate realms of
professional cricket who has devoted his life to the development
of other people's skill and enthusiasm.
We all realise that no one would be playing professional cricket
today if their passion and ability had not been fostered at an
early age.
Most of us owe our careers to those dedicated men and women
around the country who give up their time and energy to allow
others to play and flourish. In 1998 the PCA chose to honour one
of these many unsung heroes.
Tony Moody is a member of the Lambeth Borough Community Cricket
Council, who are forever trying to advance the opportunities
available to the schoolchildren of that borough to recognise
their talents.
It is one of cricket's extraordinary and unacceptable statistics
that Lambeth, boasting a population in excess of 250,000, has
only one cricket ground, the Oval.
Moody has established and run an organised programme of cricket
coaching in primary schools and in doing so has coached in more
than half of Lambeth's schools. On average he has looked after
over 100 children each week as part of this scheme.
Working in conjunction with the coaches at Surrey in the Ken
Barrington Centre, Moody then continues the development of these
young primary school cricketers when they move on to secondary
schools.
These young cricketers can then be selected for the Lambeth
cricket squad and introduced to senior clubs, a scheme in which
Moody is also totally involved. He has organised a cricket tour
to Zimbabwe, a pan-African tour of the United Kingdom, and the
Lambeth Community Cricket Day.
He is a modest man who is quick to pay tribute to others; Surrey
County Cricket Club as an organisation, and individuals such as
Pat Pocock and John Barclay.
One of the things that sets Moody apart is his unconventional
coaching technique. He uses music and singing as a medium to get
his message of the spirit, nature and disciplines of cricket
across.
The PCA recognise that although Moody is special, he is not
unique. There are many people the length and breadth of the
country who give their time, skill and energy to the development
of young cricketers at all levels.
WHILE we cannot single them all out for the attention they
undoubtedly deserve, we can recognise one of their own to try and
demonstrate just how much their contribution to our sport is
appreciated.
The evening also afforded the PCA the chance to pay tribute to
two umpires. Ray Julian was voted Umpire of the Year, and though
his acceptance speech contained one of the lines of the evening
("I'd just like to thank all those bowlers who voted for me"), he
will not mind admitting, I am sure, that the show was stolen by
one Dickie Bird.
Dickie was presented with a piece of Waterford crystal to mark
his retirement. His contribution to the game has been rich and
varied and he is enormously respected worldwide.
Despite being described by a recently-retired England captain as
being as "mad as a badger", he is the epitome of the neutral
umpire and is all that is good about our game.
He predictably brought the house down at Lord's during a brief
question-and-answer session with David Gower. He was frank about
the success of his autobiography and admitted to buying a new
Jaguar sports car with part of the proceeds.
He did not seem remotely embarrassed about the fact that having
bought the car he discovered that it would not fit through his
front gate and had to get the stonemasons in to widen the
entrance.
He did, however, seem slightly more embarrassed when admitting
that having widened the entrance he subsequently discovered that
his car would not fit in his garage.
The game needs the great front-of-house characters like Dickie
Bird, and his presence will be missed.
However, the game really needs men like Tony Moody, one of the
unsung heroes of cricket.
Source :: Electronic Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk)