Ged Roddy / Director of Sport
Joined Team Bath 1992
During his decade at the University of Bath, Ged has overseen an expansion of sports that has made it one of the top sporting universities in the country. Born in Manchester in 1963, Ged grew up in the city before attending the University of Birmingham, where he gained a degree and Post Graduate Certificate of Education. He went back to his home city to gain a masters degree in physical education at the University of Manchester. Ged worked as a PE teacher in Manchester before becoming Assistant Director of Sport at the University of Southampton.
After his appointment as Director of Sport at the University of Bath in 1992, Ged set about realising the university’s full sporting potential. He oversaw a significant £8 million investment in sporting facilities at the university campus that has seen the addition of a 400m athletics track, indoor tennis court complex, a 50m swimming pool and a range of conditioning, science and sports medicine facilities.
The culmination of this facility development led to a joint bid with the city council to host the European Youth Olympics in 1995. Acting as Director of Sports to the Games, Ged oversaw the event, which brought together almost 10,000 athletes from 48 nations.
Work was completed on a £23 million investment in additional sports facilities at the University of Bath. It features an indoor netball and badminton facility, a judo dojo, a state of the art fitness suite and an indoor running straight, as well as an indoor athletics throw/jumps area, a fencing salle and a pistol shooting range, along with state-of-the-art sports science and medicine facilities.
Ged has also led the creation of the Team Bath project, which has seen the development of 16 elite sports training squads at the university covering badminton, basketball, bob-skeleton, bobsleigh, football, hockey, judo, modern pentathlon, netball, rowing, rugby, swimming, track & field athletics, tennis, triathlon and volleyball.
Team Bath athletes now compete at the highest levels in international sport team members won three medals at the Sydney 2000 Olympics, and a gold and a bronze medal at the Athens 2004 Olympics, a silver medal at the Turin winter Olympics 2006, as well as 17 medals at the Manchester 2002 Commonwealth Games.
Football is one of Ged’s great passions. He played semi-professional football for more than 10 years. In addition to his responsibilities as departmental director, he managed Team Bath FC. Ged also was the English Universities Men’s Football Team Manager and led the student team to win the British University football title in April 2006.
The football team was only founded in the year 2000 and enjoyed considerable success in the FA Cup in 2002/3, becoming the first university side to play in the competition for 122 years. The team won its way through five preliminary and qualifying rounds before losing at home to Second Division Mansfield Town in a match televised live by Sky from the University of Bath campus. Team Bath won promotion from the BGB Southern League Premier Division to the Blue Square Conference South via a deserved 2-1 win victory against Halesowen Town in the BGB Southern League promotion play-off final.
Team Bath bowed out of football history on Saturday 25th April 2009 with their last Blue Square Conference South match after a ten year period described by manager, Ged Roddy, as “an incredible journey”.
Ged was Director of a soccer school in Canada for two years and worked as a volunteer organising promotional events during Manchester’s bid to host the 1996 Olympics. He also worked as fitness advisor to Bath rugby club and the England RFU.
Ged was also awarded an MBE in 2000 for his contribution to sport.
