Gavin Cruickshanks To Represent Team GB at Top Level

Gavin Cruickshanks, a hockey umpire for Grove Menzieshill
Hockey Club, has been selected to be part of Team GB for the
Australian Youth Olympic Festival (AYOF). This event will take
place between 16th and 20th January 2013 in and around many of the
venues which were used for the 2000 Olympic Games. 17 sports will
be competing this time round.  Further information on the
event can be found at here.

The hockey tournament will be run as a 4 nations event with the
youths of GB, Australia, Malaysia, China, USA and Argentina
competing in the men’s and women’s tournaments. Gavin has been
selected to umpire the men’s tournament which will consist of the
Argentines, Malaysians, Australians and British. This will be his
first major tournament in his bid to follow in the footsteps of
fellow Dundee umpire Ged Curran who umpired the men’s hockey final
at London 2012. 

Gavin made the decision a few years ago to concentrate on umpiring
and started with school matches and local games for Grove
Menzieshill Hockey Club.  Gavin was selected to attend a
Scottish under 16 training weekend in Largs to umpire, and
progressed to national leagues matches.  Two seasons ago,
Gavin stopped playing to concentrate fully on umpiring and it
wasn’t too long before he was selected for National League 2 and 1
games. Last season he committed to the indoor programme as well as
the outdoor and this resulted in him becoming one of the regular
national 1 umpires last season. He finished the season well by
umpiring the Scottish cup semi-final between the two big Glasgow
rivals, Kelburne and Western Wildcats.

Gavin was selected by the Scottish Umpiring Appointments
Committee to attend a weekend of the Great Britain Super League, a
small tournament for Great Britain’s finest Under 23s to compete
in. Gavin was told the event was a selection event for players,
however, little did he know that there was the chance for one male
and one female umpire to jet off to umpire in Sydney in January on
the back of their performances at this event.

Gavin received information at the end of October that he had
been selected to travel to Australia, a fantastic
achievement!  Gavin is very grateful to Scottish Hockey for
the guidance he has received and to his supportive employers for
giving him the time to realise his ambitions.  Good luck
Gavin!!

 

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