Retired cricket umpire and attention-seeker Dickie Bird has unveiled plans to further raise his statue in Barnsley town centre so that it can be seen from space.
The statue, allegedly commissioned by Mr Bird himself when he realised he wasn't deemed important enough for anyone else to do it, has already been lifted a further five feet since its original installation in 2009 - a move which at the time was thought to be an attempt to make it harder for the council to tow away, however these latest remarks suggest that this was just the first of many planned operations to raise the statue up into the stratosphere.
Speaking at a self-funded event held in his honour, Mr Bird said "This is not about me being the greatest cricketing umpire the world has ever seen, or even the greatest person the world has ever seen. It's about reaching out to everyone through the power of cricket, a constantly-visible reminder in these troubled times that we all share a common ground".
We tried to speak to Mr Bird to qualify rumours that a projector had been installed in the statue's finger that would project his face onto the moon, but were unable to get past the swathes of white-capped, sobbing children laying copies of the Barnsley Chronicle at his feet.
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