During the spring lockdown we changed the main focus of the club to our colts section. Following ECB guidelines within 24 hours of being able to use the nets we had an online booking system and local kids using the nets 7 days a week.

As soon as training was allowed we opened the club 5 days a week for colts and paid coaches to come and train the children in small bubbles, in fact we were the first club in Essex back and training with 115 socially distanced kids training within 10 days. We created a place where the colts from aged 5 -18 years could come and play a sport safely and it was a total respite from lockdown. We helped with the physical and especially mental wellbeing of the local children by throwing everything we could into getting them training and eventually playing. Apart from the money spent on coaching we also purchased new equipment to keep up with demand for children to join. By the summer we had over 150 colts at the club with our girls only training also being attended by players from Witham and Kelvedon clubs. We hosted the largest colts cricket festival of the year for Essex called the summer bash and played the first competitive colts cricket in Essex. We have spent a lot of clubs funds this season just to keep within in ECB guidelines and get kids training and playing sport.

However with the growing number of children, our focus on girls cricket, which is our biggest growth area, plus the introduction of ladies softball cricket from April at the club our nets are not fit for purpose. We also want to bring local primary schools to the club to use the new facilities so we can encourage more children to play sport.

We need to refurbish 2 nets and have 2 new nets put in.

We have raised £15,000 from club funds, so far but are way short of our target given recent quotes

We really want to get the club ready for April as it l looks like this year will be the same as last, and we may be the only team sport available in Coggeshall come the Spring.

Any financial help available would be a great help as we have tried everything from the lottery to sport England and other community grants but do not fit the profile for the current round of funding.