Improving cricket for all at Earlswood CC

Aim: We are raising funds to replace our 20+ years old practice nets, improving and expanding the facilities for existing and future members

Who are we?

Earlswood Cricket Club is based in Warwickshire and has provided its local community and surrounding villages with the opportunity to play cricket for over 145 years. 

We are a traditional, community village club that caters for players of ALL abilities. We don't just focus on the elite players but try to ensure that everyone gets the chance to represent the club and enjoy the game. 

We have expanded rapidly in recent years as people get to know what a friendly non-Corporate club we are with a welcoming, family feel. Don't get us wrong, we like to win, but we also pride ourselves on our traditional village club roots and great social atmosphere. There's nothing better than seeing everyone come back to the home ground on a Saturday evening and finding out how they all did in the five sides and listening to stories of the day. 

Likewise junior training nights on Fridays are always packed and great fun with a good atmosphere. Most parents and their children stay after the formal sessions just to chat, enjoy the facilities and chill in the evening sun.

We now have over 300 players aged from our youngest at 4 to our current eldest who is in his 70s! We currently run 22 teams across all age groups.

Senior cricket

We run five sides on a Saturday; a 1st team playing in the higher divisions of the Warwickshire League through to development sides playing in the lower divisions and lots in-between. We also play Sunday League cricket to a high standard typically with a colts team.

Women and Girls

Our Women and Girls section has enjoyed growth over the last couple of years. We are hoping to encourage more female members off the back of the Women's T20 tournament which is featuring for the first time at the nearby Birmingham Commonwealth Games this summer. We already run a Women's 1st team and a Development team and are anticipating a need for a 2nd team in the near future.

As an indication. over 50% of last years All Stars intake for 5 to 8 year-olds were female and it is a focus growth area for the club. 

Junior Cricket

Alongside All Stars we also operate the ECB's Dynamos program aimed at 8 to 11-year olds and a full junior setup with teams at every age group from under 9s to under 19s including all girls teams at under 11, under 13 and under 15.

We encourage our "older" juniors to take part in the coaching of the younger ones, especially All Stars and Dynamos alongside qualified adults. A number have gone on to take their coaching badges which gives us a good home-grown pool that get involved in match day management as well as training. All of our coaches are DBS checked regularly.

Very seniors!

Not to forget our older players, we also have an Over 45s team that recently won the Worcestershire Over 45s competition. We encourage those players to continue playing well into their 50s and older and pass on their experience to the next crop of juniors coming through.

Community impact

Earlswood takes its place in the community seriously and we do what we can to encourage people to take up the game of cricket for fitness, mental wellbeing and just being part of the Earlswood family.

We closely liaise with five local Primary Schools running the Chance-to-Shine program for them at the ground. We are also developing closer ties to our local secondary school and hoping to encourage players there to come and try out the game, especially girls from the South Asian community. There is anecdotal evidence that cricket is a great way of getting them to take part in exercise and become part of a club environment. 

We recently invested in our clubhouse installing heating and refurbishing the toilets and bar area. This is already proving popular with residents from the nearby villages who are beginning to see Earlswood as the social hub we want it to become. 

Alongside cricket we also carry out virtual walking, running and cycling missions to maintain fitness through the Winter and to keep non-playing members involved.

Why are we crowdfunding?

Our practise nets have been in place for over 20 years and are in dire need of replacement. Over the years members have patched them up and replaced netting but they have now become unfit for purpose and putting players off due to the uneven bounce off the concrete base. 

The current nets are also open-ended meaning that we have to be very careful who is using them whilst there is a game in play or training elsewhere on the ground. Installing an enclosed state-of-the-art facility will make things safer for spectators and people training and it will allow us to open the facility out to more people making better use of the space.

2022 Commonwealth Games

The next Commonwealth Games are to be based on our doorstep in nearby Birmingham. Featured this time will be Women's T20 cricket and we are expecting an upsurge in interest in the game off the back of that. 

We have worked hard to get the coaching infrastructure in place over the last 12 months and feel we are in a good position to manage the training of an increased number of members. However, we also need the facilities in place to safely introduce these new players to the game and to improve the standard of our existing members. 

How we’ll spend the money raised

We have plans in place to build a three lane net facility with two of the lanes fully enclosed. We will use the existing nets area and will dig out the current base and replace it with a state-of-the-art facility that will serve current and future members for many years to come.

How you can play your part

There are four simple ways to help us reach our target, and make this project a reality.

• 1. Make a pledge and claim your reward. Don’t delay if you’re going to support us because momentum is key to our success!
  
  
• 2. Spread the word. Share our project on your social media pages and tell the world to get behind us! The more people we reach, the more support we will get.
  
  
• 3. Offer rewards yourself. Get involved if you are a local business by donating things we can offer to our supporters. We will give you a shout out!
  
  
• 4. Create a fundraiser of your own. Use the button on our page to get started. Setting up your own page only takes a few minutes and you won’t need any bank details. Just a fun idea!