Who are we?
We are Mousehole AFC, a community-based football club located in the far west of Cornwall. Our primary goal is to secure £100,000 in funding to create an essential new access road for our football club. This project's significance lies in its ability to redirect heavy traffic away from our local community during match days and the summer season, while also serving as a crucial stepping stone for our club as we advance through the leagues. Your contributions are greatly appreciated. Feel free to explore our enticing rewards, and please help us spread the word among your friends and family.
In recent years our first team has risen rapidly through the leagues and now sits at the highest-ever position are club has occupied, in the Pitching In Southern League. We also field a development squad which is very competitive in Cornwall, a women's team that is riding high in the league and youth teams at all age groups.
At our heart is a belief in football as a force for good in local communities. We strive to offer as many people as we can the chance to compete, watch or gain valuable career opportunities. Amongst our volunteers we have young people training to be coaches, physiotherapists, video journalists, photographers and match reporters.
Our Story - The Pilkington Cut
This video will give you a little more insight into who we are and what we want to achieve. We asked fiend of the club Karl Pilkington to voice this for us. Read a little more here about how this came about! In the video you'll hear from the manager, chairman, players and volunteers about what makes Mousehole special.
What about our future plans?
For a small village club from such a remote part of the country, our ambitions are big. Just a few seasons ago, our matches were played within an hour's drive of the village. Now we regularly travel to grounds beyond Bristol and Salisbury, clocking up over 7000 miles in a season.
So how high do we want to see the club go? We've not set ourselves a target other than to say we are going to progress as far as we can go within our capacity to do so. With two more promotions, we could be playing in the National League. That means a second team from Cornwall will be represented at the highest levels of non-league football in the UK.
We are proud of what we've achieved so far and what we bring to the local area as a result. The journey we're on is exciting and we don't want to stop here.
Why are we crowdfunding?
As the club has grown, we are attracting increasing support, with fans coming to watch us from as far away as Bristol - a 400-mile round trip! But increased popularity brings with it increased headaches for the local village. Traffic coming to our ground at Trungle Parc has to pass through the tiny village of Paul, through narrow streets in a quiet residential area. The cars, buses and delivery lorries then have to battle the potholed lane that leads directly to the club. It's not good for the local community, for accessibility – and not good for suspension and tyres. It's also our hope that a better access road to the club will provide better access for emergency vehicles.
As a club, we are not owned by one individual but rather we are run by our committee of volunteers. We function solely on the income we generate ourselves from match day ticket sales, bar and catering facilities, youth subscriptions and sponsorship from local businesses. Our regular income is augmented by seasonal income from our campsite which functions at full capacity for 3-4 months a year. This income is enough to keep us going as a football club, but it won't stretch to building major infrastructure like a road. We are all volunteers at the club so we need to seek the generosity of others to allow us to proceed with this project.
How we’ll spend the money raised
Planning permission is in place to build a road leading directly from the car park next to the club to the local road, which runs between Penzance and Lands End. The land has been gifted to the club by the neighbouring landowner, who is also a big supporter of the club. We intend to use the money raised to complete the regulatory requirements and then design and build a suitable road. Hopefully, the funds will also allow us to improve the quality of the car park allowing for greater accessibility and a safer parking environment for the public.
Community Impact
The impact of the project will be to take traffic away from the local village of Paul. Match days see traffic jams building in the village from 1pm onwards. Cars are often parked on the narrow lanes approaching the village. Additionally, the football club runs a campsite and the summer months see camper vans and other traffic pass through the village regularly. Building the road will completely bypass the need for this traffic to use the village.
In addition, we hope that an improved access road to the club will encourage more community groups to use the facilities at the football ground, not just for watching games but also using our clubhouse for community-based activities such as yoga, community learning, physiotherapy, cultural events and even dog shows.
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. 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. 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. Fundraise for us. If you want to run your own fundraiser – maybe a sponsored activity or similar – use the 'contact project' button at the top of our page to let us know. Setting up your own page only takes a few minutes and you won’t need any bank details. Just a fun idea!
Completing the project
If additional funds allow, as well as our road project there are several other ongoing projects to which this fund may contribute to help us provide a better facility for all of our community.