Petworth Park CC: Fundraising for Facilities

Aim: To buy and upgrade equipment & facilities at Petworth Park Cricket Club.

Who are we?

Petworth Park Cricket Club is an open to all community cricket club, nestled in the heart of the South Downs in a beautiful and historic deer park in West Sussex; serving the community of Petworth and surrounding area and providing opportunities for all ages and abilities to enjoy and participate in the sport of cricket. 

The Revival

In 2016 a group of locals re-founded Petworth Park Cricket Club after it had folded and built a new club from the ground up.  In 2017 a club committee was formed, a constitution was adopted and PPCC began its journey to bring cricket back to the community of Petworth.

From the early days in of two men and a mower discovering a long discarded cricket square in the middle of Petworth Park Sports ground and setting to work to restore the ground, we undertook a year of hard work and planning and cricket finally returned to its rightful place in Petworth Park.

In the seven years since its resurrection, PPCC has grown from a standing start having been rebuilt from the ground up to now offer junior, women's and adult cricket for our community: with three adult league teams, a Sunday XI & T20 XI, a Women's Soft Ball Cricket league team, four Junior age-group teams, and offering the ECB All Stars & Dynamos programmes.

The club was incorporated as a Community Interest Company (CIC) in 2017, with CASC status (Community Amateur Sports Club) following in 2021. In 2023 the club achieved ECB Clubmark accreditation in recognition of being a well run, well organised club with good values, inclusivity and safeguarding at its core. 

The club has now taken on a second ground in Tillington to fulfil the growing demand, and additional funding for facilities is now needed, with a dedicated grounds team to assist with upkeep and necessary ongoing renovations at both grounds.

Why are we crowdfunding?

The progress on the field has outstripped progress in improving facilities, and now the club's main focus is on fundraising for facilities. We are working very hard to secure funds for additional equipment including a new score-box, a Flicx Pitch, sight screens, pitch covers and further grounds machinery.  

All of this equipment will have a massive impact on our ability to develop and provide more match play and training for all sections; it would hugely benefit the whole club and ensure the continued development of junior, women’s and adult cricket in our community. The new equipment would help all  sections to practice and play safely alongside one another throughout the season.

This fundraising project is intended to cement the rapid progress the club has made over the last seven years, by delivery quality facilities which leads to increased participation.  

The investment in facilities will help secure the future of the club after an establishment period that has seen so much growth.  Currently our participation levels are high in spite of, not because of, the quality of the facilities.  

How we’ll spend the money raised

• Sight Screens.  There are no sight screens at the ground, and this is an important feature of any club, making the game safer as the ball is often hard to see against the backdrop of a dark hedgeline or tree.  £3k - £4k
• New Scorebox.  The existing score box, as much as it is dearly loved, is decades old and badly rotten.  The numbers are clumsy and dysfunctional.  We would like to invest in a new scorebox, equipped with digital numbers and ready for the modern scoring and live-broadcasting of scores.  We’d also like to have a small repeater scoreboard linked to the pavilion which is situated a long way from the boundary.  £8k - £12k
• New Covers.  When PPCC was re-founded in 2017, three committed members drove to Scarborough to collect an eBay purchase - three roll-on covers.  These have served well for the price paid, but we now need to get serious about keeping our pitches dry with the growing number of fixtures.  We would like to buy a new set of up to date roll-on covers plus side sheets to make our groundsman’s life easier and get more games on! £4k - £6k
• Flicx Pitch.  A Flicx pitch is a brilliant roll-out man-made pitch that's totally portable and versatile as it can easily be used for junior matches, women’s soft ball cricket matches or adults, and can be used in the net area inside an existing mobile batting cage.  This would be a great way of us getting more simultaneous matches on and increasing cricket opportunities.  £4- £4.5k
• Grounds Machinery.  This an area that needs considerable improvement.  The main priorities are currently are a good wicket mower, a powered brush/rake and (if budget permits!) a triple mower for the outfield to replace the current tractor led gang mowers.  £10k - £25k (machinery can be cut to the size of the available funds, including the option of refurbished second hand machinery.

Depending on the amount raised we will buy the new equipment required in order of priority.

Community impact

The club is very proud of the impact it makes in our community.  In 2017 we launched our first crowd fundraising project to  fund the excavation and relaying of the cricket square, an essential piece of work in order for cricket matches to be played at Petworth Park again! We successfully raised enough for the initial ground works to be undertaken and took our first steps to develop the ground for a new generation of sports players and enthusiasts.

In 2018 we launched a successful campaign to raise money for a new practice net facility. With the help of generous donations our project was successfully completed and we were delighted to officially open our new nets facility in June 2021, to cater for all the new juniors, women and adults we were getting active through cricket after the challenges of the Covid-19 outbreak.

Our progress on the field has outstripped progress in improving facilities, and we desperately need additional funding to help continue to sustain and grow our club to continue to offer sporting opportunities to juniors, women and adults in our local community. 

The club is very inclusive, offering a range of opportunities for all ages and abilities. The Club offers bursaries for young people from disadvantaged backgrounds /where financial barriers to participation may otherwise exist.

The Club has strong links with community organisations and we have actively reached out to our local schools and youth organisations to give their pupils and young people the opportunity to learn and play cricket. This has included running club-funded after school clubs and coached cricket sessions for Petworth Primary School, Midhurst & Rother College (secondary school), and 1st Petworth Cub Scouts and Beavers. This outreach work has resulted in closer community links, giving local young people the opportunity to try out a sport they may not necessarily otherwise have the opportunity to, and has brought new young players to the club. 

We maintain high levels of communication with our members and encourage two way communication through regular communication and surveys. We offer support to our young people in accessing programmes such as the Sussex Pathway and Young Leaders in Cricket; and we support club members and players in pursuing coach training, having a team of volunteer coaches all ECB qualified via the Club.

Our History

Cricket in Petworth Park has a history dating back to the early 1800's, with five recorded first class matches in the 1840's when Petworth Cricket Club was briefly a major team. The pitch was originally in front of Petworth House (now owned by the National Trust) before it moved to ‘Petworth New Ground’ a short distance from its original site, still within the historic deer park but in a dedicated area for sports where for decades Petworth Park Cricket Club has played in the beautiful current position overlooking the South Downs.

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!