B-Oxford Conversion at Oxford City Lacrosse Club

We are looking to raise £6100 to support the installation of four Box Lacrosse substitution gates and appropriate netting to surround the indoor turf at The Oxford Academy's indoor dome.

Lacrosse is the fastest turf game on two feet! Heading to Oxford!

Played by the Haudenosaunee (a confederation of six Native American nations) since the Medieval period, the sport has been played in Oxford for over 100 years at Oxford University. Oxford Brookes joined in the late 2000s, and since 2012 a keen group of graduates, parents, returners and newcomers to the city have run Oxford City Lacrosse Club for the entire Oxfordshire community for all ages.

Build it and they will come!

The Oxford Academy school is the home of our club; its facilities include an outdoor Astro-turf with lacrosse markings, grass pitches, and an indoor dome with 3G turf. The indoor dome is now used regularly by national teams, elite representative squads, and external lacrosse camps. Our proudest achievements have been to host the Team GB Sixes Lacrosse squads, and the England National Women's Lacrosse squad.

Our club's recent successes are unparalleled across the country!

The club's leaders, David Brucie Morris and Annabel Campbell, have strived to develop community lacrosse for juniors based at the school. Oxford City hosts weekly training sessions and termly community outreach programmes which culminate in a junior community tournament at The Oxford Academy. The school has begun to introduce more curriculum and after school lacrosse for Y7 and Y8, and are looking to introduce box lacrosse to their older pupils for boys and girls in 2022. Our senior teams have been extremely successful this year, winning their leagues, and our Mixed side reached the National Club Championship final in May.

A new string to our bow, and the bid to become the best lacrosse club in the world!

Thanks to the progress of Oxford City LC, the opportunity for junior box lacrosse, the location of the school in the south, and the potential for the indoor dome to become an excellent venue for box lacrosse, SEMLA would like to ask for your support to fund further work to improve the venue. Sport England will match all funds raised so we are seeking a minimum of £3050. The cost to install substitution gates will be £5663. The remaining £437 will be spent on additional netting, supporting steel wire and to cover the Crowdfunder transaction costs. Any further matched funding above £6100 will remain with SEMLA for our support of box lacrosse in the south delivered by Southern Box Lacrosse (SBL).

The addition of box lacrosse will mean we will become the only club in the world that will offer ALL five versions of lacrosse!

Why should I donate?

Due to the financial pressures of the pandemic on our core activities, we have decided to use Crowdfunding with Sport England to help fund this transformational development of the indoor dome. It is due to the progress of Oxford City LC, the opportunity for junior Box Lacrosse, the location of the school in the south, and the potential of the indoor dome to become an excellent venue for Box that we would like to ask for your support to fund further work to help repurpose the venue.

Walt Christianson, the head coach of the England Men's Box National Team (see below photo), has described the venue in glowing terms, "I think the potential for Oxford dome is great. It is fairly centrally located, the flooring is good, and the size, although it is a bit wide works well. The square corners are a bit of a problem, but the positives far outweigh the problems."

Walt describes what the next steps are for box lacrosse to continue to grow:

- have a central facility for box lacrosse to call home

- change the seasons of play to allow and encourage the field players to be able to play all three games of lacrosse, at the national and international level

- have a specific season of play for box so that leagues can be arranged in the north and south, allowing players to play box lacrosse games on a regular basis.

- funding to support the growth of box lacrosse from England Lacrosse.

Thank you very much for supporting our project and we hope we will be able to host an event soon at B-Oxford for all of those who have generously donated!