Old Craven Park
| Location | Holderness Road, Hull, East Riding of Yorkshire |
|---|---|
| Opened | 1922 |
| Closed | 1989 |
Old Craven Park was a rugby league and greyhound racing stadium in Hull, East Riding of Yorkshire, England.
Hull Kingston Rovers moved from Craven Street in East Hull to a new ground called Craven Park in 1922. The club had purchased a site behind the tram and bus depot on the eastern end of Holderness Road by Aberdeen Street at a cost of £18,281 and it hosted its first game on 2 September 1922.
The ground staged Great Britain Test matches in 1926 (a 21–11 win against New Zealand) and in 1929 (an 8–31 loss to Australia).
In the early 1970s Hull Kingston Rovers purchased a site at Winchester Avenue with the aim of building a new stadium there. These plans never came to fruition and the site was later sold to a private developer. The profit made from this land was used to buy back Craven Park with greyhound racing continuing as a subsidiary concern.
A company called Entertainments Hull Ltd brought greyhound racing to the stadium to rival the operation at the Boulevard Stadium and the first meeting took place on 5 May 1928. The lease was soon secured by the Associated Greyhound Company who also had control of Towneley Stadium in Burnley and Darnall Stadium in Sheffield but the company went bankrupt and the greyhound operation suffered difficult times with a depression on the horizon.
With the greyhound racing boom underway a new company called Hull (Craven Park) Stadium Ltd bought the stadium from Hull Kingston Rovers in 1938. The rugby team secured a 21-year lease in the £10,750 sale. The track raced under National Greyhound Racing Club (NGRC) rules and the circuit was described as a handy sized track with a circumference of 407 yards with good length straights and with starting boxed that are set back to take full advantage of the length of the straight. Banking was 1 in 12 and an 'Inside Sumner' hare was used. Distances of 292, 496 & 698 yards made up the races and the stadium kennels charged owners one guinea per week, an agreement that included veterinary attention.
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