Some plans take a long time to come to fruition, so I very much enjoyed a visit to Mersham Sports Club. It is the best part of ten years since they approached me about buying some land from the Church Commissioners to extend their facilities, which are in great demand.
Finally last week I was able to walk on the muddy field that will give the club another six acres to work with, allowing four more football pitches and an artificial cricket wicket. By the summer of 2024 this field should be humming with sporting activity, with archery another sport Mersham offers.
This land has been bought with a huge amount of local fund-raising and grants from others including Ashford Borough Council and Mersham Parish Council. One of the other important elements is support from the Football Foundation, whose Chief Executive Robert Sullivan joined us at Mersham.
The Foundation, which is funded by the FA and the Premier League, as well as the Government through Sport England, is expanding its grants beyond simply providing football pitches. Mersham benefits from this as it is a prime example of a multi-sports club which is having to cope with the very welcome problem of increased demand, especially from women and girls.
The success of various women’s national teams has caused an explosion of interest, and by some measures women’s cricket is now the fastest growing sport in the country. So there will be many junior teams of boys and girls playing football or cricket every weekend in Mersham, as well as the various adult teams.
Extra pitches make scheduling much easier for the hard-working volunteers who are the backbone of every sports club, and obviously allow more players to take up their favourite sport. Many people have put in years of effort to make this project succeed, and I am so pleased to see it so close to coming together.