THE future is bright for Falkland Cricket Club.
The first team finished third in Thames Valley League Division 1 last season, the youth section is thriving and their impressive new pavilion will start to open from April onwards.
The club boasts more than 400 members, 56 vice-presidents, 75 adult playing members, 40 family members, 125 junior boys, 90 women and girls, and 30 players with disabilities.
They run eight weekly men’s teams, 17 junior age groups sides four girls teams and a women’s adult team in the Home Counties Women’s League.
Berkshire, the reigning national Minor Counties champions, have already moved their offices to the new facility. And with the 2021 season set to start in May – Covid permitting – there is a sense of optimism surrounding the club.
While club members and fundraising campaigns have enabled the construction of the new pavilion, Falkland are still on the lookout for more support. So they have put together a package to attract new sponsors to the club.
The basic package is £250 per season (plus VAT) plus the cost of an advertising board or banner in the first year.
The sponsor receives:
- Board advertising around the ground
- Free fireworks tickets to the club’s renowned annual display
- An invite to the club’s sponsors lunch
- Advertising in cricket fixture brochure
- Advertising on the club website
- Use of the ground for team building events on agreement.
Any businesses interested in sponsoring the club, should contact Graham Beal at cricket@falklandcc.co.uk or call him on 07771 775170.
Falkland Cricket Club is a registered charity and has existed since 1884, sited on 9.5 acres of woodland, cricket grounds and battlefield site of the 1643 Civil War Battle of Newbury, which is overseen by Historic England.
The new pavilion has the usual player facilities and a social enterprise pub/bistro, called The Bowlers Arms.
In 2019, more than 16,000 people visited the club, ensuring it is sustainable, and they host an annual fireworks display, which in 2019 attracted a record 5,000 people.
On the field, Falkland enjoyed their best season for several years in 2020 – albeit disrupted by Covid – and they are determined to regain their place in the Home Counties Premier League.
Falkland’s previous pavilion was built in 1974 using second-hand builders’ huts.
But the new pavilion development has been the catalyst for a phenomenal increase in the community usage of facilities and a
significant increase in the range of cricket across adults, teenagers, juniors, girls, and those with disabilities.
The club has been designated as the ‘hub’ in West Berkshire for girls and disability cricket.
It has a specialist disability coach who runs adapted versions of the game during the day for residents of a local care home, who have long-term physical and mental disabilities and recently won the Get Berkshire Active Health Project Award.
In 2019 Falkland was awarded ‘The Club with the Most Inclusive Community Offer’ by the ECB.
The new pavilion, community rooms and offices will meet the needs of Falkland, West Berkshire and Berkshire Cricket for the foreseeable future.
The building will match the excellent on-field playing facilities used by Berkshire CCC.
In non-Covid times, the club offers facilities to non-cricket local groups who use the community room. This supports the cohesion of the Wash Common community and delivers towards West Berkshire Council’s policies for a vibrant rural area.
It is a much-loved resource used by the parish church, local schools, music, arts and drama groups, yoga, cycle and motor cycle groups, The Newbury Ukulele Society, voluntary community groups such as The Parkinson Society, The Samaritans, and The Ramblers.