Billingham Synthonia CC Fundraiser

Aim

We need your help to assure the sustainable survival of cricket in our community in the aftermath of COVID-19.

Our Organisation:

Billingham Synthonia Cricket Club was formed in 1923 and nearly one hundred years later we have three senior teams, our 1st XI competes in the North Yorkshire and South Durham ECB Premier League, our 2nd XI in Division Four and our 3rd XI in Sunday Conference North. We also have a fledgling junior section, featuring the ECB flagship programmes All-Stars and the newest junior programme Dynamos as well as promoting cricket in local primary schools in years 5 and 6.

The Effects of COVID-19 on BSCC:

The pandemic has shattered sporting communities across the country and BSCC is no exception. As a result of restrictions, 2020 has been a tough year financially for our club. With the complete loss of income from our functions business, we now look to fundraise to ensure the financial security of our cricketing community and the continuation of our club’s improvements plan.

The Projects you are Funding:

• Groundsman Equipment - A new Outfield cutter and Wicket Roller
• Training Equipment - 'BOLA Bowling Machine' and other training aids.
• Improved Seating for spectators.
• Junior Training Equipment - Size and age appropriate balls and training equipment.

Groundsman Equipment:

A major priority is securing our groundman’s equipment. Much of our current machinery is older than our playing members and the evident financial shortfalls threaten our ability to fund a replacement in the coming season. We would like to invest in:

• A new outfield cutter - over 25 years old.
• A new wicket roller - our current one is over 60 years old (pictured).

Maintaining a high quality facility is important to our goals of attracting more representative teams into our community, over the past few years we have welcome the British Army Cricket Team, England PD (pictured), an India academy team from Mumbai and Northern Universities who have regularly used BSCC as a home ground.

Training Facilities:

We would like to invest further in our training capacity by purchasing a BOLA bowling machine to accompany our new net facility. Our players have already raised a small percentage of the cost for the machine and any donations received would support these earlier efforts.

We want to improve these facilities to increase our capacity to provide physical activity to those in our community with young and old. A bowling machine is the perfect addition and look forward to sharing it with our playing members in 2021.

Improved Seating:

In addition to providing better facilities to our players, we want to improve our spectator experience. Our spectator seating is now very old and following the removal of weathered seats last year, our seating capacity has been greatly reduced. As a result, we would like to purchase more benches to replenish the seating capacity around the ground.

We aim to continue our history of hosting events at our ground, from cricket specific finals days such as the 2019 Regional T20 knockouts to firework nights (pictured) and live music.

Our Smaller Members:

An important part of continued investment is our junior equipment. We would like to invest in:

• Age and size appropriate equipment for our growing junior set up.
• Skill specific training aids such as specialist wicketkeeping stumps and bowling targets.
• More basic equipment to support the transition for soft ball to hard ball cricket.

The legacy of our Junior Section is clear to see. An example, Ben Phillips (pictured) has won the Senior's Sunday Player fo the Year Award 2020 and was part of a duo that represented the first XI in the Premier League last year.

Our Club in the Community:

Our club strives to provide competitive cricket and a community hub for local people. With your help, we can continue going from strength to strength and increase the availability and quality of the sporting opportunities available to those in our community.

Thank You!

#UPTHEOG

This project successfully funded on 6th April 2021