Message Board - Cricket: Ground Usage Policy

Anyone got a template for a grounds usage policy?

ie. our lacrosse section are using more of our cricket outfield for winter training & we want to put a policy in place to "protect" the ground as far as possible.They already use 1 part so we are aware of the arising probs but I need to create an agreement for them to sign so they are accountable!

Slightly of topic here E.W.,as i have said in an previous thread,our cricket club have been approached by the university if they can use our outfield for lacrosse practice and matches.can you give us any further indication as to the damage/things to look out for if we give the go ahead? .Also many thanks to those who have given us some guidance already,much appreciated guys.I have tried to steer them away from saying yes from your responses,but some of them are seeing £££ signs!!!!

just saw that..this is my 1st time using this board so bear with me! I manage a 5 section sports club in earlsfield...our cricket pitches turn into lacrosse & hockey pitches in the winter. Hockey causes v little damage but lacrosse does (not as bad as football or rugby though). The first year lacrosse played the state of our outfield was appalling & we had to spend more than triple £ than usual on renovations in Apr/May. Its got better but its not ideal to be honest. After a few years its become a bit better as we are very strict on cancelling lacrosse & we don't allow any kind of roundrobin/back to back tournaments but its not that easy to police.
We also had a ladies lacrosse team (clapham ladies) who used to play here but it was all too much for the ground & they had to leave us.
So my advice would be that unless you are charging enough to cover yourself for the huge hike in renovations plus profit...unfortunately it really can cause a big problem for you

The only £££ signs nifty are those that will be spent on renovation, i dont agree with EW , so far as our outfield has become predominantly worse. this season the cricketers are in uproar, plus our club saw the £££ signs , but 20 cans of coke on a saturday is hardly worth opening the door for..

I am head groundsman at a multi use sports facility that has lacrosse and damage can be quite severe but this depends on how many games are played of course, I would say that to get your cricket outfiled back to something like you would have to spend something like we do on our Rugby pitches around 2.5k per pitch, that should give you enough for seed topdressing and the contractor to do it, depending on the size of your outfield just scale it up.

We had an approach re lacrosse on our outfield a few years back and there were those who could see the pounds signs too.

We were being offered £200.00 and I thought, that would enable me to hire in the necessary renovation equipment when the last match was played AND I could also utilise it over the cricketing part of the outfield. BONUS!!

My hopes were deflated when the £200.00 was for the rental of the ground including all the preparatory work including the line marking for their whole season!!

Needless to say - we only play cricket here!!

LOL @Mario. 200 quid for the whole season. Ha Ha

Not lacrosse but I've had a couple of inquiries about a couple of rep games but they seem to want it for next to nothing.
What do you guys think is a reasonable price for playing on a lovely ground next to the river?
A factor is also that I've only got ten proper pitches to get me through the season.

Barry, £200-£500 + catering.

i'm in the process of putting a very rigorous set of usage policies in place, which will be rolled out this September. I have found that in general, people's general approach to how they use grounds is out of order, hence the set of policies that I am devising. Reviewing all of our pricing is also being undertaken - I think paying less than £50 for a game of cricket or Rugby is a bit of a joke...

Big changes on the horizon for us in the near future...

Mike

Thanks Vic
I wasn't that far out then. I quoted British Police £175 plus catering for fifty over match. Too much for them though.
Maybe its because they are using our money!

Get it all the time Barry, they are all playing charity matches or want something for nothing. Give them a price, if they want it they take it, if not, nothing lost.

...and does the Groundsman get anything for all the extra work ?

....and to those of us on a fixed buget do we get reimbursed for extra materials/fuel etc....?

I am sure we are all loyal to our clubs, but the "cost" to the groundsman never enters people's heads.

Steady Tony, you're starting to sound like the rest of us who do it for the love.

Lol chaps! My thoughts exactly. Just more work for no extra dosh!
Thinking of changing my name to Barry "can you just" Glynn.

Other than rep matches we rarely if ever hire out grass tracks, people simply ain't willing to pay what it costs. To be fair though, we hardly ever get any enquiries - I can't easily count on one hand the number of times I've been asked.
Rep matches are a completely different matter. They're not hosted with making money in mind. They're hosted for the prestige. If nothing else it makes getting sponsors a little easier. Potential sponsors want their name associated with places which host county level stuff.

And i thought they went where it was not going to cost them JL. How wrong can i be? I'm sure if we charged they would play at your place even more, especially as we are a long way from headquaters. Coaches dont like the journey.

I've got a County under 10's in a couple of weeks and we are allowed to 'claim' £75.00 (inc.catering) for the day./

Minor we used to have the same issue until the bursar worked out we where subsidize the county club to the tune of £250 per sunday game. Guess what it stopped as soon as we tried to charge the county the actual cost without any profit. Ian

Grassman, You're almost certainly correct.
I meant they're not hosted from 'our' point of view as a money making exercise. It looks good for the club to be hosting rep games.
We lose money on every rep game we host. But I can't put a value on what it's actually worth to have them here. There's no doubt that when approaching potential sponsors it makes things a lot more appealing for them.

It would be interesting to know if that is right JL, we do not have any sponser boards, just a couple of adds in the fixture list. How much do you reckon each board brings in?

We bring in somewhere around 4K a year from boards.

Interesting