Dickie Bird (1933-2025): Loved, respected, popular and the super star umpire who rarely gave LBWs | Cricket News

Often, Bird found himself in bizarre situations on the field. He once cut Sunil Gavaskar’s hair after the Indian legend found it was disturbing his vision while batting; calmed the crowd when a burst pipe threatened to flood the playing field during another match; and even took players off the field when sunlight bounced off a window into the eyes of the batsmen.

Above all, there was this instance when he sat on the covers on the pitch, protecting the wicket, when there was a bomb scare at Lord’s in a Test in 1973. It led to his most famous photo, engulfed by fans all around the pitch as the stands were evacuated. Just as he defused tense situations, be it with an angry Dennis Lillee or an irate Javed Miandad, he also chatted with crowds, keeping them calm. Such was the respect he had within the cricketing fraternity that, before his final Test in 1996, he was given a guard of honour on the outfield at Lord’s by the India and England players.

Bird never married, wedded as he was to cricket. “Came close twice but I live out of suitcases and it would not have been fair to the wife. What I miss is having a family,” he reflected once.

A file image from July, 17, 1997 shows former Test umpire Harold ‘Dickie’ Bird posing for a photo. (PA via AP)

A wonderful narrator of humorous tales, he has written a few memoirs, and was a natural in telling stories, often self-deprecating. One involved his name. Once, the late Richie Benaud, Australian captain and commentator, asked him, ‘Do you mind being called Dickie?’, as he was born Harold Bird. Pat came the reply, “No, you can’t forget a name like that, can you!.”

There is this lovely moment in a recent ITV documentary on Bird. He is standing, open-mouthed, beside his statue built in his hometown Barnsley in Yorkshire. At first sight, it seems he is admiring the immaculate capture of the artist — the statue has a cricketing sweater wrapped around his waist, as was his wont during his umpiring days, and he is frozen in the act of giving a batsman out with his inwardly tilted finger pointing to the sky.

But it turns out something else had moved him.

Bird proceeds to break down as he reveals how the statue is at the “exact same spot where I was born”, and remembers his parents. It turns out his home was among the rows of houses that once stood there. “He (Bird’s father) died because of dust in his chest,” Bird says pithily. “The doctors told me your father had a wonderful body on the outside, but inside his heart was shattered”.

Fortunately, Bird’s father saw him play county cricket though he didn’t live long enough to watch him umpire. He doesn’t say that in the documentary but on his father’s deathbed, he informed that “I am going to become an umpire”. Next day, his father died.

But then, what his father couldn’t see, the world saw and celebrated. And true to his eccentric nature, Bird’s first day as a first-class umpire in 1970 started on a hilarious note. Wary about London traffic as it was the Rugby League Cup final and he was put up in a hotel far from the Oval ground, he asked the surprised hotel receptionist to give him a 4.30 am alarm call. He had toast and tea, and left, reaching the ground at dawn. The gates were locked, and as he threw his bag over and was trying to climb, a policeman stopped him.

“Well, officer, to tell you the truth, I know you are not going to believe me, but my bag’s gone over the wall,” he recounted years later on BBC Radio’s Desert Island show. Once he explained the situation, the “bobby” hung around with him for an hour.

On another occasion, he was invited to lunch with the queen at quarter past one. That day, Bird left home at 5 am and was about to get on the train when he realised he had left his ticket behind in the car. He pleaded with the guard to hold the train for a minute and got this classic reply: “Dickie, I’ll hold the train up, but I wouldn’t hold the train up for your mate Geoffrey Boycott” – a reference to the mercurial England batsman who was also from Yorkshire.

Dickie Bird was quite a sight on the cricket field: white cap and white umpiring coat, and white sweater around his waist, often chatting with players and pulling up errant bowlers. He had his ball counters, the miniature red barrels that he would fiddle with after every ball, and lots of chewing gum for the players. And a “pen knife, a spare rag in case the ball gets wet, a spare cricket ball, a spare bale, scissors (that day, he had snipped the hair-fringe of Gavaskar, incidentally, during his first Test hundred in England), plaster in case someone grazes their arm, needle, cotton…” he told that BBC radio show.

Above all, this fidgety character had his way with fiery fast bowlers. Once he rebuked the Australian Merv Hughes for cursing relentlessly at England batsman Graeme Hick. A startled Merv replied, “Dickie Bird, you are a legend” — and stopped the cussing.

As the news of Bird’s passing spread, one couldn’t help but wonder how he would have handled the volatile India-Pakistan matches at the Asia Cup. If anyone could have defused the tinderbox situation, reminding the players to behave themselves, it would have been him.