Birmingham venue bathes in blue to raise funds for prostate cancer research while fans compete in fancy dress
Edgbaston turned Blue for Bob on Saturday, part of a fundraising campaign run by the Bob Willis Fund to raise money for prostate cancer research and awareness. They’ve raised £800,000 in their first two years, part of which has gone towards the development of new, non-invasive tests at the University of East Anglia. The day doubles up as a celebration of Willis, there were hundreds of big bushy wigs on show, and a bowling net behind the RES Wyatt Stand where people were invited to attempt their best impressions of his loping run. Impressive as all that is, the fund’s most remarkable achievement may be that they managed to persuade Willis’s hero, Bob Dylan, to be their Honorary Patron. Dylan is a baseball fan and even wrote a tribute to the New York Yankees’ pitcher Catfish Hunter. His only known contribution to cricket, though, is the brief epitaph he offered Willis: “Bob Willis was a great sportsman who left too soon. I’m happy to keep his flame and cause alive.”
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