About us...
We are a strong community based club with over 100 senior and junior members aged 6 - 66. We run five senior sides - two competitive league teams on Saturdays, two friendly teams on Sundays (almost a unique achievement in Surrey club cricket) and one which plays a range of fixtures on Bank Holidays and midweek evenings in competitive and friendly 20/20 matches.
The two league sides play in the Surrey Downs League and we were both 1st and 3rd Division champions in 2011.
One of the strengths of the club is the family feel. We have a number of players still playing in their 50’s and 60’s often with their sons – and several of the older players now play for Surrey over-60s.
A club with history...
We celebrated our 125th birthday in 2010 when we used the opportunity to start the project for a new clubhouse . We look forward to our new buildling being the symbol of a new era for the club.
A youth section that is powering ahead...
Claygate has put effort and investment into developing its junior sides.
Anyone who watched the performance of some of our highly promising colts playing in our senior sides last season will have been given real confidence in the youth section’s ability to make a big difference to cricket at Dalmore Avenue in the future.
Thanks to a growing support in the club, we’ve been able to put substantial effort into developing our colts and the benefits are really starting to show. We have some great prospects playing at the junior level at the moment. WE now have five teams playing competitive cricket in the West Surrey Youth League and Kwik Cricket continues to flourish on a Sunday morning.
The club also started to reach out directly to local schools running an after school cricket training session at Claygate Primary School. Leading on from this, the club hosted a schools Kwik Cricket competition featuring four local primary schools. It really reflected the way in which the club wishes to develop in the future.
Building on this, we hope to further develop our links to local schools including the running of coaching sessions over school holidays and as part of our partnership with Hersham we have an ambitious plan to help them develop youth cricket there as well.
We’ve also invested in an all-weather artificial strip so we are able to play colts games even after bad weather, or if there is heavy use of the main cricket square. The Hersham ground will provide a second wicket so we can run two matches on the same day and have also purchased a bowling machine which will give young players the chance to face a whole variety of different bowling in more intensive practice sessions.
A heritage of international tours
The club’s last tour was to the Eastern Cape in South Africa in February 2008. It was no ordinary overseas club tour with three of the nine matches being played against black townships.
This was Claygate’s seventh international tour, and in the last fourteen years we’ve travelled to all parts of the cricketing globe. ( Sri Lanka 1995, Barbados 1997, Goa 1999, South Africa’s Garden Route 2001, Trinidad and Tobago 2003, St Lucia 2005 and South Africa’s Eastern Cape 2008)
On the 2008 trip we took 24 players and the same number of wives, partners, family and friends. We played nine games, including a final day/night match against a Border Invitation XI at the international ground at Buffalo Park. Claygate also raised over £5000 to purchase cricket equipment for the development of cricket in the townships which was presented to Border at the end of their tour.
We have solid sponsorship support and community backing...
We are very grateful to Grosvenor Billingshurst for their support with shirt sponsorship as well as sponsoring the main clubroom in the new clubhouse . The Griffin also provides us generous support and for providing a great place to meet before away games! We are always looking to increase this support and level of engagement with local businesses so please get in touch if you think we can help as a shop window for your business.
And a new clubhouse!
Claygate has played on the Recreation Ground in the centre of the village since the 1930’s. The old clubhouse was built at that time and became completely unsuitable for the needs and demands of today . After three years of planning , fundraising and building we are looking foreward to opening our new clubhouse in the middle of 2012. It will be a great moment.
