Hockey coach wins lifelong service award

Norman Hart attended the award ceremony in Hull with his colleagues

A Norfolk hockey coach who has worked with a university team since the 1970s said it was a "major honour" to win a lifelong service award.

Norman Hart joined the University of East Anglia (UEA) as the hockey team's coach in 1971, before becoming the club's captain and later honorary president.

He was awarded the AD Munrow Award, which was given to a person who has made a "significant" impact on university sports, at the 2025 British Universities and Colleges Sport (BUCS) annual awards.

Mr Hart said: "It's been a privilege to be involved in hockey at UEA for so many years and it has provided me with some of the most intense and enduring friendships of my life."

Alongside his work with the UEA's hockey team, Mr Hart has been working with two local charities where he lives in Harleston.

"I'm a terrier, once I get my teeth into something, I can't let go," he said.

For Mr Hart, the joy of the job came through the people he met.

He said: "You do your time at university, you finish, and you go and live your proper life.

"It gave me the chance to mix with intelligent, articulate, cosmopolitan crowd of people who shared a passion for hockey."

He added: "Half my Christmas card list is ex-UEA hockey players."

Mark Heazle, head of sport and physical activity at UEA, said: "No one has done more to progress the growth of hockey at UEA or possibly across the country than Norman over a sustained period of time."

"He truly is a legend of the sport he loves and fully deserves the accolades for helping recruit people to it, and doing the hard work, week in and week out, to get people playing and enjoying hockey."