Witnessing countless students become professionals, even leaders in their fields, Director of Sport David Williams has seen it all. The University’s fiftieth year has seen a record number of students engaged in sport, bringing home the highest ever points tally from national leagues. As Essex enters a new half-century, two of its have students competed in the Glasgow Commonwealth Games, and a cricketing alumnus now plays professionally for Essex Cricket Club.
We spoke to David as part of our 50th anniversary celebrations for a chat about sport at Essex in the past, present, and future.
Talk about your job at the University.
I have been director of sport since 1998, but I have been here since 1989 as Assistant Director of Sport. My role now is to deliver on sports strategy, overseeing the management of the sports facilities. I work closely with the sports club, making sure they get the training times and the facilities that are needed. I also need to consider what the Essex Blades want, what a recreational user might want, and so on.
What was sport like at Essex then, compared with what it is now?
Everything was on a much smaller scale.
Our facilities were spread out across campus. Apart from the sports hall, there wasn’t a centralised facility. For example, our fitness room (we are now in the 6/7 version) the original one was over in square 5 under what is now Barclays Bank. When I arrived, the fitness room was located where the Print Centre is now. It was spit and sawdust, a basic place. It wasn’t a particularly pleasant environment, either.
Looking back I think it’s another sign of the times. Student expectations are one thing but the quality of service has also improved. To try and get a weight training area up and running in the mid-1970s, my predecessor literally got scaffold poles and put lumps of concrete poles at the end of them. It was the original indoor facility – which was the size of a badminton court – over in square 2. It also held the climbing wall, I say climbing wall, and it had handheld holes that were just bolted onto the wall. You could have people working out on the ground floor, and people climbing on the walls at the same time. You wouldn’t get away with it now, that’s for sure.
We also had four squash courts down on campus. The whole thing was a right palaver – if you were student you had to go to the sports hall, get a token to use the courts or the key for the fitness room, go back to campus and then bring the keys or equipment back on your third trip. It wasn’t great quality of service- that’s something that has greatly improved.
With new plans for sports halls and various other sporting facilities, the University of Essex looks set for another exciting 50 years of sport.
That’s the plan, that’s the plan. Some things are going to happen sooner than others: we are hoping that in the next two years, we will have an additional sports hall, which, when complete, will be the equivalent of 12 badminton court sizes.
We are still deciding [on the location] on that. But I think part of the plan is to locate it where the tennis courts are, where they will be relocated quite soon. We think, so long as we get planning permission, they will go to the other side of the artificial pitch. They will also be “bubbled” so they will be covered too.
Brilliant! So no postponements on future BUCS games at Essex then?
Exactly. That’s been an issue here at the university. Tennis never used to be a regular Wednesday fixture, it was to be a one-day tournament where you would send a team down to. Outdoor courts suffer in the winter, as do the tennis and netball teams. We plan to bubble them during the winter so we can make sure fixtures are fulfilled and then in the summer we will take the bubble down.
Will the sports hall also be multi-use?
It will be multi-use to an extent. We have around 50 clubs here at the university, and many of them don’t use the indoor facilities. But, you just need to look at the sports hall floor and see it’s just a multitude of lines. What we are hoping to do is make the new sports hall specific towards basketball and volleyball. Other activities that don’t require lines on the floor such as archery and fencing can also make use of it. We will have one central court that will be specific for basketball and volleyball and look into the other – say two-thirds – of the hall with badminton court lines too.
Our ambition is to become a venue where students can come and play those sports. We will have bleacher seating as well so we create a makeshift arena. That is how the court will be configured.
One thing that is common throughout all universities and sports is BUCS. What impact has the organisation had aat the University of Essex?
Well I think BUCS is another version of what was before in some respects. BUCS is the organisation for competitive sport between institutions, essentially. Before that, we had the same with BUSA and before that it was UAU.
The biggest change occurred in 1992 when the polytechnic colleges became universities. All at once, you had far more institutions playing sport at this level. So when I came here we had block fixtures, where we played UEA (who were in our region at the time). We would take four or five coaches to UEA and play them at home and away. Such a fixture replicated Derby Day twice a year but without the thrills that come with it.
The block fixture disappeared in 1992, which in a way was quite sad, and it was replaced by a merit league. And so all of a sudden we wouldn’t be playing in a block, a football team might be playing at home, a couple of rugby teams playing away and another couple of teams at home.
Now block fixtures are a thing of the past, it’s difficult to find out how other teams are getting on. We have five football teams, so it is hard to actually find out how other clubs are doing. You used to find out how the netball teams are getting on, how rugby are doing all because you were on the same coach on the way to these fixtures. Beforehand, it was Essex versus whoever, but now it’s just how your own team is getting on.
It’s a bit sad really, but the saturation of the league with institutions made it really difficult. Now, we have more competitions – we have the cup, the trophy, and regional cup competitions – BUCS is really trying to provide that competitive opportunity to the Essex Blades at their level.
This season we have seen the best BUCS season ever at the University of Essex. Is it a shock how much we have achieved?
I don’t think it is a shock because we have planned for it. To be honest, it’s because of the recent level of investment the university has dedicated to sport. Performance sports, like volleyball and basketball, are prime examples of this.
But it’s more than just the investment in performance with MyEssex. Free sport was introduced just this year. As a result, the number of people participating in sport has trebled – it’s gone through the roof. You’re not discriminating people from cost, they can play more than one sport easily. Before, students could join one, maybe two clubs. Now students can join three or four, given time constraints, at no extra cost.
That’s made a huge difference. We have seen an improvement in the quality of the teams because more people are willing to join the clubs, to commit to them, and to compete for the university.
It’s a combination of the two [investment and free sport] but it was also part of the plan but also we can go to improve BUCS specifically to see what we can do to improve the points total.
Cricket still need to finish their season, but we look set to finish with our highest ever points tally.
We’ve always finished in the mid-to late-30s, low 40s [in BUCS]. Given the relative size of our university, I think we have punched above our weight for a long time. We actively participate, but clearly what we haven’t got is the budgets of Loughborough, Durham, and Birmingham.
That’s true, but the likes of Loughborough have five national governing bodies based on their campus.
We often use Loughborough as an example. Their swimming team beat us on BUCS points in what we achieve overall. That’s what you are up against, when we go into the hundreds of BUCS points, they’re going into the thousands.
But our ambition is to get into the top 25 in the next 3-4 years.
Adeseye Ogunlewe, Nigerian Athlete and Essex student who competed in the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games
With renewed investment in performance sports, will they be key contributors to BUCS success?
Oh absolutely.
Now we are actively recruiting for students who are at a high standard in that sport whereas we got students in their by chance. They would come to the university looking at their course and we would be like “okay you’re good at this sport, we will give you a bursary.”
I think futsal are our only team in the Premier League of BUCS, and it won’t be long before the likes of volleyball and basketball get to that level. And it’s not just getting there – it’s maintaining ourselves at that level too. The only way to reach that now is to get that investment into those particular sports.
I think we are realistic in that sense. Possibly, we will look into investing in another three performance sports as well, and then specialise in those to gain a reputation. We aren’t parachuting people like some other institutions. What athletes are getting here is the full package like the athlete’s village [over in South Courts], the lifestyle support and physiological support. It’s not just a simple “okay you’re good at Volleyball, come and join us and away you go,” – it’s not like that. They get an all-round education.
We have seen notable success from cricketer Tom Moore who now plays professional for Essex County Cricket Club. Victoria Clow (Scotland) and Adeseye Ogunlewe (Nigeria) both competed in the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games. Have there been any other successful sports stories from the university?
There’s quite a number on the back of the bursary scheme. Given we haven’t got our own pool, we have had a couple of decent swimmers that have gone onto national competitions in the past.
Going further back, we had a world champion at croquet. There used to be a croquet lawn outside Wivenhoe House.
Scott Moorehouse, a Paralympian who competed in the London 2012 Games in Javelin. He is probably our highest achiever I would suggest. Dom King, too, although not a student, but as a member of staff, competed in the Olympics (50km racewalk).
Emma Lewcraft, national champion in Karate, too stands out.
Another is Andy Turner, the hurdler who competed for Britain in the 2004 Olympics in Athens. He wasn’t with us for that long, he transferred from Loughborough, and I think he was only here for a year.
John Pipe competed for English Universities in rugby, and Ryan Wall competed for English Universities in football.
Abbie Thorinton was a triathlete. She is still competing, I think. What comes to mind is her level of training and commitment. Those early hours of going swimming and cycling before her lectures started. You’re testing my memory here!
Last but certainly not least, Kenny Gasser played football for World Student Games. His claim to fame? He played for Ipswich Reserves whilst he was a student here, scoring a hat-trick against the Arsenal Reserves.
That must have hurt a little, with you being an Arsenal fan?
[Laughs] Yeah, I think I still have the programme somewhere too.
Victoria Clow, Rhythmic Gymnast, competed in the Glasgow Commonwealth Games
You were here when we first won Derby Day, at home too, that must have been a memorable one.
Yeah I was! But, I have to say, my most memorable Derby Day was last year, when we hosted it here on a Sunday. It was the first time we’d moved it from the Wednesday and the weather was fantastic. When you have a thousand students competing in sport, I actually think it was quite special.
We didn’t win it that year, but when you host it, you invariably win it. Moving it from the Wednesday meant we didn’t have to worry about lectures or other commitments. And the competition was really good, we only lost by two points!
It wasn’t just the sport side, but how composed we were and the media coverage. The marquees down on campus were successful – the competitors could get sports massages and physiotherapy throughout the day. The TV coverage (I saw a sneaky preview of that) was pretty good.
My son went to UEA – he was the football captain, and he competed in that Derby Day too. I saw SX:TV’s coverage on the screens, I felt it was a bit like Sky TV, and they actually mentioned that “the Director of Sport has got his son here on Derby Day for UEA”. I thought it was good, it was excellent.
I was talking about Derby Day with my son recently and he said he that the Derby Day experience in 2014 was in his top 3 social experiences as a student at UEA. So that’s how good that Derby Day was, so it was special there too. The actual event was just superb.
Fifty years of sport: An audience with David Williams | The Rabbit Newspaper
Witnessing countless students become professionals, even leaders in their fields, Director of Sport David Williams has seen it all. The University’s fiftieth year has seen a record number of students engaged in sport, bringing home the highest ever points tally from national leagues. As Essex enters a new half-century, two of its have students competed in the Glasgow Commonwealth Games, and a cricketing alumnus now plays professionally for Essex Cricket Club.
We spoke to David as part of our 50th anniversary celebrations for a chat about sport at Essex in the past, present, and future.
Talk about your job at the University.
I have been director of sport since 1998, but I have been here since 1989 as Assistant Director of Sport. My role now is to deliver on sports strategy, overseeing the management of the sports facilities. I work closely with the sports club, making sure they get the training times and the facilities that are needed. I also need to consider what the Essex Blades want, what a recreational user might want, and so on.
What was sport like at Essex then, compared with what it is now?
Everything was on a much smaller scale.
Our facilities were spread out across campus. Apart from the sports hall, there wasn’t a centralised facility. For example, our fitness room (we are now in the 6/7 version) the original one was over in square 5 under what is now Barclays Bank. When I arrived, the fitness room was located where the Print Centre is now. It was spit and sawdust, a basic place. It wasn’t a particularly pleasant environment, either.
Looking back I think it’s another sign of the times. Student expectations are one thing but the quality of service has also improved. To try and get a weight training area up and running in the mid-1970s, my predecessor literally got scaffold poles and put lumps of concrete poles at the end of them. It was the original indoor facility – which was the size of a badminton court – over in square 2. It also held the climbing wall, I say climbing wall, and it had handheld holes that were just bolted onto the wall. You could have people working out on the ground floor, and people climbing on the walls at the same time. You wouldn’t get away with it now, that’s for sure.
We also had four squash courts down on campus. The whole thing was a right palaver – if you were student you had to go to the sports hall, get a token to use the courts or the key for the fitness room, go back to campus and then bring the keys or equipment back on your third trip. It wasn’t great quality of service- that’s something that has greatly improved.
With new plans for sports halls and various other sporting facilities, the University of Essex looks set for another exciting 50 years of sport.
That’s the plan, that’s the plan. Some things are going to happen sooner than others: we are hoping that in the next two years, we will have an additional sports hall, which, when complete, will be the equivalent of 12 badminton court sizes.
We are still deciding [on the location] on that. But I think part of the plan is to locate it where the tennis courts are, where they will be relocated quite soon. We think, so long as we get planning permission, they will go to the other side of the artificial pitch. They will also be “bubbled” so they will be covered too.
Brilliant! So no postponements on future BUCS games at Essex then?
Exactly. That’s been an issue here at the university. Tennis never used to be a regular Wednesday fixture, it was to be a one-day tournament where you would send a team down to. Outdoor courts suffer in the winter, as do the tennis and netball teams. We plan to bubble them during the winter so we can make sure fixtures are fulfilled and then in the summer we will take the bubble down.
Will the sports hall also be multi-use?
It will be multi-use to an extent. We have around 50 clubs here at the university, and many of them don’t use the indoor facilities. But, you just need to look at the sports hall floor and see it’s just a multitude of lines. What we are hoping to do is make the new sports hall specific towards basketball and volleyball. Other activities that don’t require lines on the floor such as archery and fencing can also make use of it. We will have one central court that will be specific for basketball and volleyball and look into the other – say two-thirds – of the hall with badminton court lines too.
Our ambition is to become a venue where students can come and play those sports. We will have bleacher seating as well so we create a makeshift arena. That is how the court will be configured.
One thing that is common throughout all universities and sports is BUCS. What impact has the organisation had aat the University of Essex?
Well I think BUCS is another version of what was before in some respects. BUCS is the organisation for competitive sport between institutions, essentially. Before that, we had the same with BUSA and before that it was UAU.
The biggest change occurred in 1992 when the polytechnic colleges became universities. All at once, you had far more institutions playing sport at this level. So when I came here we had block fixtures, where we played UEA (who were in our region at the time). We would take four or five coaches to UEA and play them at home and away. Such a fixture replicated Derby Day twice a year but without the thrills that come with it.
The block fixture disappeared in 1992, which in a way was quite sad, and it was replaced by a merit league. And so all of a sudden we wouldn’t be playing in a block, a football team might be playing at home, a couple of rugby teams playing away and another couple of teams at home.
Now block fixtures are a thing of the past, it’s difficult to find out how other teams are getting on. We have five football teams, so it is hard to actually find out how other clubs are doing. You used to find out how the netball teams are getting on, how rugby are doing all because you were on the same coach on the way to these fixtures. Beforehand, it was Essex versus whoever, but now it’s just how your own team is getting on.
It’s a bit sad really, but the saturation of the league with institutions made it really difficult. Now, we have more competitions – we have the cup, the trophy, and regional cup competitions – BUCS is really trying to provide that competitive opportunity to the Essex Blades at their level.
This season we have seen the best BUCS season ever at the University of Essex. Is it a shock how much we have achieved?
I don’t think it is a shock because we have planned for it. To be honest, it’s because of the recent level of investment the university has dedicated to sport. Performance sports, like volleyball and basketball, are prime examples of this.
But it’s more than just the investment in performance with MyEssex. Free sport was introduced just this year. As a result, the number of people participating in sport has trebled – it’s gone through the roof. You’re not discriminating people from cost, they can play more than one sport easily. Before, students could join one, maybe two clubs. Now students can join three or four, given time constraints, at no extra cost.
That’s made a huge difference. We have seen an improvement in the quality of the teams because more people are willing to join the clubs, to commit to them, and to compete for the university.
It’s a combination of the two [investment and free sport] but it was also part of the plan but also we can go to improve BUCS specifically to see what we can do to improve the points total.
Cricket still need to finish their season, but we look set to finish with our highest ever points tally.
We’ve always finished in the mid-to late-30s, low 40s [in BUCS]. Given the relative size of our university, I think we have punched above our weight for a long time. We actively participate, but clearly what we haven’t got is the budgets of Loughborough, Durham, and Birmingham.
That’s true, but the likes of Loughborough have five national governing bodies based on their campus.
We often use Loughborough as an example. Their swimming team beat us on BUCS points in what we achieve overall. That’s what you are up against, when we go into the hundreds of BUCS points, they’re going into the thousands.
But our ambition is to get into the top 25 in the next 3-4 years.
Adeseye Ogunlewe, Nigerian Athlete and Essex student who competed in the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games
With renewed investment in performance sports, will they be key contributors to BUCS success?
Oh absolutely.
Now we are actively recruiting for students who are at a high standard in that sport whereas we got students in their by chance. They would come to the university looking at their course and we would be like “okay you’re good at this sport, we will give you a bursary.”
I think futsal are our only team in the Premier League of BUCS, and it won’t be long before the likes of volleyball and basketball get to that level. And it’s not just getting there – it’s maintaining ourselves at that level too. The only way to reach that now is to get that investment into those particular sports.
I think we are realistic in that sense. Possibly, we will look into investing in another three performance sports as well, and then specialise in those to gain a reputation. We aren’t parachuting people like some other institutions. What athletes are getting here is the full package like the athlete’s village [over in South Courts], the lifestyle support and physiological support. It’s not just a simple “okay you’re good at Volleyball, come and join us and away you go,” – it’s not like that. They get an all-round education.
We have seen notable success from cricketer Tom Moore who now plays professional for Essex County Cricket Club. Victoria Clow (Scotland) and Adeseye Ogunlewe (Nigeria) both competed in the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games. Have there been any other successful sports stories from the university?
There’s quite a number on the back of the bursary scheme. Given we haven’t got our own pool, we have had a couple of decent swimmers that have gone onto national competitions in the past.
Going further back, we had a world champion at croquet. There used to be a croquet lawn outside Wivenhoe House.
Scott Moorehouse, a Paralympian who competed in the London 2012 Games in Javelin. He is probably our highest achiever I would suggest. Dom King, too, although not a student, but as a member of staff, competed in the Olympics (50km racewalk).
Emma Lewcraft, national champion in Karate, too stands out.
Another is Andy Turner, the hurdler who competed for Britain in the 2004 Olympics in Athens. He wasn’t with us for that long, he transferred from Loughborough, and I think he was only here for a year.
John Pipe competed for English Universities in rugby, and Ryan Wall competed for English Universities in football.
Abbie Thorinton was a triathlete. She is still competing, I think. What comes to mind is her level of training and commitment. Those early hours of going swimming and cycling before her lectures started. You’re testing my memory here!
Last but certainly not least, Kenny Gasser played football for World Student Games. His claim to fame? He played for Ipswich Reserves whilst he was a student here, scoring a hat-trick against the Arsenal Reserves.
That must have hurt a little, with you being an Arsenal fan?
[Laughs] Yeah, I think I still have the programme somewhere too.
Victoria Clow, Rhythmic Gymnast, competed in the Glasgow Commonwealth Games
You were here when we first won Derby Day, at home too, that must have been a memorable one.
Yeah I was! But, I have to say, my most memorable Derby Day was last year, when we hosted it here on a Sunday. It was the first time we’d moved it from the Wednesday and the weather was fantastic. When you have a thousand students competing in sport, I actually think it was quite special.
We didn’t win it that year, but when you host it, you invariably win it. Moving it from the Wednesday meant we didn’t have to worry about lectures or other commitments. And the competition was really good, we only lost by two points!
It wasn’t just the sport side, but how composed we were and the media coverage. The marquees down on campus were successful – the competitors could get sports massages and physiotherapy throughout the day. The TV coverage (I saw a sneaky preview of that) was pretty good.
My son went to UEA – he was the football captain, and he competed in that Derby Day too. I saw SX:TV’s coverage on the screens, I felt it was a bit like Sky TV, and they actually mentioned that “the Director of Sport has got his son here on Derby Day for UEA”. I thought it was good, it was excellent.
I was talking about Derby Day with my son recently and he said he that the Derby Day experience in 2014 was in his top 3 social experiences as a student at UEA. So that’s how good that Derby Day was, so it was special there too. The actual event was just superb.