Covid response - Groundsman's Shed Refurbishment

Aim

We’re raising funds to refurbish our run down, leaking and insecure Groundsman's shed, making it functional & secure to store our machinery.

Refurbishment of our Groundsman's Shed

We’re a town centre based cricket club with great links to our local community offering cricket and physical activity sessions for everyone as well as a wide range of social events for everyone to get involved in!

Our users, local community residents and groundsmen have been complaining for some time about our current Groundsman's shed facility because it is ugly on the eye, leaks, is insecure after numerous break in attempts and the machinery stored inside is starting to get damaged due to the run down state of the facility. We had a number of fundraising events planned in 2020 to help raise money to carry out some these essential refurbishments, Race Night, Sponsored Walk, Golf Day and Fun Day but they all had to be cancelled due to Covid, making it impossible for us to raise any money to make these much needed improvements. So we have set up this Crowdfunder page to try and help!

Why we're asking for your HELP - the impact of COVID 19!

In 2020 ALL our fundraising events, race night, golf day, sponsored walk, bbq, fun day and  legends nights all had to be cancelled because of Covid 19. We’re a section of Doncaster Town Fields Sports Club, all our income has to be generated through fundraising, we don’t receive any money from the bar. These fundraising events bring in approximately £20,000 per annum, allowing us to improve our facilities for use by our local community. Having these events cancelled has left our club in a difficult position and struggling to make the improvements needed to our facilities to keep them maintained, safe and open to all our users. We also lost over 50% of our annual subscriptions and 80% of our annual club sponsorship due to local businesses struggling during the pandemic. We're adapting to the times and looking to fundraise through Crowdfunder. Completing this project will allow us to upgrade our Groundsman's shed facilities so they’re fit for purpose, pleasing on the eye and will allow our Groundsman to continue keeping our facility in great condition for training, matches and community events all year round.

Rewards - Grab yourself a great deal! 

We have managed to put together a wide range of rewards that will hopefully appeal to a wide variety of our local community and encourage people to donate to our campaign. Check out our rewards to see if there’s anything that takes your fancy, there are some bargains to be had!

Our Cricket Club

Our cricket club provides cricket and physical activities to everyone from our local community. Running sessions for boys and girls from 5 years old up to men's and women's sessions for all ages. We also run open sessions for our community, targeting elderly people in particular for cricket based activities. Local schools and groups also use our facilities throughout the year. We also hold a wide variety of social events for our local community and users ranging from quiz nights, race nights, fancy dress parties and BBQ’s which allow everyone to mix, make friends and enjoy the atmosphere. 

What we do....

Senior Mens Cricket

We provide cricket for senior mens cricket on a Saturday, running 4 teams who compete across the Yorkshire Cricket Southern Premier League pyramid. Our 1st XI won the Premier League in 2019, our 2nd XI won the division 2 title in 2020 and our 3rd & 4th XI continue to compete in their respective leagues whilst developing our junior players in senior cricket.

Women's & Girls Cricket 

Our hardball women and girls team have gone from strength to strength and compete in the Div 2 Yorkshire Women and Girls League. Formats such as Super 8’s, 30 over league games and the National T20 Vitality knockout competitions allow regular competitive games to be played. 2020 saw the first competitive season for our newly launched women and girls softball team. An exciting game that is increasing in its popularity amongst the women and girls of South Yorkshire.

Junior Cricket

We have delivered the All Stars programme for the last 3 years, giving 5-8 year olds their first taste of cricket. We also run teams at U9, U11, U13, U15 & U18 where we compete in the Doncaster, Wakefield and Sheffield Leagues. Our junior section is one of the strongest and most successful in the Region.

Social Events for our Community

We had a thriving social calendar at the club before Covid 19. Many people from our local community attend events we put on including, Race Nights, Fun Day, Raffles, Quiz Nights, BBQ’s, Fancy Dress Parties, Golf Day, Legends Nights, Sponsored Walks and much more. We hope to be able to bring all or some of these events back in 2021!

Holiday Camps

We run holiday camps during Easter, Spring Bank, Summer and October Half Term for children from our local community. They prove very popular for children to continue keeping active in the school holidays and parents and guardians can carry on going to work knowing their child is in a safe, structured and fun environment.

Our work with Schools

We do outreach sessions in our local schools to promote cricket during the curriculum and after school as wells providing exit routes to our club. We have also hosted the Boroughs cricket competitions for the last 5 years.

Facilities for All Our Community

We have fundraised and invested in facilities over at our site over the last 5 years that are open to our community. These facilities help everyone stay active and enjoy the all round physical, mental and social benefits that cricket brings. We had a 3 lane off field astro-turf practice area installed and refurbished our open 2 lane astro-turf facility. We have also installed a number of benches to allow individuals and families to enjoy the facility socially.

Partnerships 

This section will be updated as we progress through our campaign, we have approached a number of large businesses from our local area who we hope to partner with. Either to make monetary donations to our cause or to donate some of the materials we will need to undertake the Groundsman's shed renovation. We hope our offer of publicity through our website, social media channels and local newspaper as well as displaying their company details on the refurbished shed itself will help us form these partnerships.

Our Project in depth 

The newly refurbished Groundsman's shed will allow us to first and foremost secure the facility and make it water tight, ensuring the facility is secure and machinery isn’t getting damaged and is usable to prepare our ground without the worry of it getting stolen. It will make the facility more pleasing on the eye, which local community residents would like to see. All of the above will allow our groundsman to maintain our grounds, ensuring everyone from our local community can continue playing cricket and other activities, stay active and socialise in a safe and modern environment. These facilities will provide our community with this opportunity for many years to come.

The money we raise will be used to repair the roof and walls of the facility and make an open plan space inside the facility to store all ground equipment and machinery. We will block up one end of the facility with breeze blocks so there is only 1 access point and square off the facility with a small extension, put in a level and suitable floor and install a roller shutter door to ensure the facility is secure and machinery can be moved in and out of the facility easily and safely. This will cost approximately £18,000 to carry out all the required works. This will give our groundsman a suitable facility in which to work and store their equipment keeping it safe and dry. This will allow them to continue maintaining our ground, allowing all our users to continue playing cricket and other activities.

Your help would mean so much!

We need your help to achieve our target and realise our dream of refurbishing our Groundsman's shed this summer before the bad weather comes again. This will help us recover from the impact of Covid, invest in essential facilities, that will allow our Groundsman and volunteers to continue maintaining and improving our facility so that EVERYONE from the community to continue enjoy the physical, mental and social benefits our facility brings for many years to come.

This project successfully funded on 17th April 2021