Durham Wasps: What Happened?
Kimberly Dicki
2025-04-23 21:53:53
Count answers: 5
The team was eventually bought by Sir John Hall and moved to Newcastle in 1996, when Durham’s rink closed. The Wasps’ old rink, in Durham City, has stood idle since it was last used as a bowling alley in 2009. An era of sporting history is coming to an end, with work underway to demolish the former home of the legendary Durham Wasps ice hockey team. It is to be demolished to make way for 9,500sq metres of office space, a visitor centre and a cafe.
Tressie Conroy
2025-04-14 18:51:30
Count answers: 3
Sadly, ice hockey in Durham became a victim of its own successes and ambitions. The last days of the Wasps came within only a few years of their greatest era. In 1995, Sir John Hall purchased the team as part of the Newcastle United Sporting Club, with the intention of moving the club to a rink that was to be built near St James's Park, in Newcastle. When they moved to Newcastle Arena the following season, they were renamed the Newcastle Cobras. The links with Durham were lost forever. Unfortunately, the departure of the Wasps brought financial difficulties to the Durham rink. It closed on July 8, 1996, reopening a year later as a 20-lane bowling alley.
Granville Goodwin
2025-04-14 18:46:49
Count answers: 2
But as the game became more popular and commercialised, the Wasps found it harder to compete, with the Cardiff Devils plundering their top players. The Riverside also needed significant investment and there wasn’t the money to do it. As Smith said in an interview: “The writing was on the wall in 1993 and then there were financial difficulties in 1994.”
In a bid for the Wasps to survive in some form, a hugely controversial decision was taken to become part of the Newcastle Sporting Club concept dreamed up in the 1990s by Sir John Hall. He bought the Wasps, intending to move them to a new rink in Newcastle. In the meantime, they found a temporary home at the Crowtree Leisure Centre in Sunderland.
The plans for a new rink in Newcastle came to nothing, so a deal was made which resulted in the Whitley Warriors being evicted from the Telewest Arena to make way for the team. After a season of playing out of Crowtree, Wasps were taken to Newcastle and renamed the Newcastle Cobras.
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