The country’s third indoor cricket dome has opened its doors, giving access to cricket and community activities all-year-round and creating opportunities for thousands more people to play the sport.
The facility at Sporting Khalsa FC in the West Midlands was installed by SAPCA member, Total-play, and funded by the cricket’s national governing body, ECB, and follows two similar domes in Bradford and Darwen, Lancashire.
Offering three lanes of cricket, the facility will be operated by Sporting Khalsa FC, a Sikh charitable organisation which is expanding its community offer into cricket, having recently been awarded Football Association 3-Star Accreditation for its community sport operations. It serves a large ethnically diverse population in an economically underprivileged area, providing opportunities for people from all backgrounds to play the sport.
ECB Chair Richard Thompson said: “Our goal is to make cricket the most inclusive team sport and our third new cricket dome will open up access to hundreds of thousands of people in the West Midlands.
“We’ve already seen from Bradford and Darwen what a difference facilities like these can make, becoming community hubs and offering not just cricket but access to other activities as well.”
The site was chosen to test the flexibility of working in a tight space in an urban environment. The club and Staffordshire Cricket Board have been key partners.
As well as the existing sites in Bradford and Darwen, advanced development of two more domes is also under way in Luton and at Farington, Lancashire, with partial funding from the Government. A pipeline of further dome projects is in development with Recreational Cricket Boards across England and Wales.
Jason Britton, Development Director Staffordshire Cricket commented; “The new dome is an excellent facility and it will serve both the local and wider cricket communities where the demand for the game sometimes struggles to find capacity in traditional indoor spaces. We are incredibly grateful to the ECB for the investment into Staffordshire and we look forward to working closely with the team at Sporting Khalsa to continue to grow access to the game.”
Rajinder Gill, Club Chair of Sporting Khalsa said; “Our goal has always been to provide a multi-sport facility that serves as a beacon for the local and our wider community and the cricket dome is another fantastic addition to our site. We would like to thank the ECB for the investment at Sporting Khalsa and we are excited to work in partnership with Staffordshire Cricket to fully utilise the facilities.”
The opening of the facility also marks the official launch of the new £45m Building Belonging in Cricket Fund, which will use money from sales of The Hundred teams to invest between £50,000 and £1m into grassroots cricket projects across England and Wales.
Projects which will receive monies from the fund will need to be focused on growing the game and benefit women and girls, disabled participants, people with lower incomes or ethnically diverse communities, as part of making cricket the most inclusive team sport.
The fund is expected to deliver over £150m in total economic value by drawing in additional funding for projects from other partners, including the government. Applications will be solicited by recreational cricket boards, with the fund aiming to support strategically significant projects including further cricket domes, indoors cricket or sports halls, community cricket venues, multi-sport hubs and large scale non-turf pitches and practice facilities.
ECB’s Thompson said: “Through the Building Belonging in Cricket Fund we’ll be able to invest £45m from the sales of The Hundred teams into more grassroots projects, breaking down more barriers and supporting communities which currently lack the facilities they need to play and enjoy all the good cricket can give them.”