We have exciting news for you all.
At the end of March, Dulwich CC formally took control of the Griffin Sports Ground in Dulwich Village, together with our partners at Lambeth Tigers FC. The charity we established together, the London Youth Sports Trust, has signed a 30-year lease with the Dulwich Estate. DCC will be the principal summer user, and we will be playing cricket there this summer!
It’s a development will transform the future of our club, and the future of women’s cricket and racially inclusive cricket in London. The cricket facilities at the Griffin will be completely redeveloped, and the ground will be home to our Women’s and Girls’ teams, as well as being used by the senior men and boys, allowing us to significantly enhance all our cricket programmes.
We will also be using the Griffin to advance racial and social diversity in cricket in partnership with Black cricket clubs and organisations, and local state schools. We all know this is an urgent priority for our sport, as has been highlighted by the Azeem Rafiq case.
Now, we’re asking for your help to make the most of this outstanding opportunity.
Together with our partners, we need to raise £100,000 as the final tranche of funding we need to get the Griffin going – and we would be enormously grateful for your generosity and support with the Get the Griffin Going Appeal.
How you can help
Many of you were kind enough to make generous donations to the Griffin project when we announced it last summer. We are extremely grateful for your support, which has enabled us to capitalise the charity that runs the ground, and to ensure that Dulwich CC will be the site’s primary cricket user. Thank you – we would not have been able to take advantage of this opportunity without you.
Now we have signed the lease and taken control of the site, we are launching a new fundraising initiative, the Get the Griffin Going Appeal. This will do exactly what it says on the tin – it aims to raise the £100,000 that we and our partners need to conduct some essential ground repairs, and to kit the Griffin out with everything we need to enjoy cricket there this summer and beyond.
We are confident of securing significant grants from funders such as the England & Wales Cricket Board and the Football Foundation for ambitious capital developments that will make the Griffin the finest cricket ground in the region - such as a 10-lane net facility, a new square, and new changing rooms. We do however need £75,000 in match-funding to unlock a £185,000 grant from Sport England that will enable us to conduct two critical pieces of work at the ground – replacement of the drainage system, which is broken, and replacement of the pavilion kitchen.
We also have a £25,000 target to fund the cricket equipment we need:
Covers – £10,000
Roll-out Flicx wickets, to support practice and junior games on the outfield - £7,300
Batting cages, to pair with the Flicx wickets for net practice - £4,000
Boundary rope - £1,200
Roller - £1,000
Sundries, including netting to allow concurrent matches to be played safely, stumps, flags, training kit etc - £2,500
We know we can reach this goal if the Dulwich cricketing community comes together to raise these funds collectively.
We would of course be extremely grateful for any donations you may be willing to make directly to the appeal – though we know that this is a very difficult time for many families, and that it may be impossible for you to contribute financially yourself.
We would also like to encourage our junior members to join the fundraising drive directly – they will be the people who benefit most from the Griffin, and it’s our experience that they are often our most effective fundraisers and ambassadors!
One of under 11 girls has shown the way by raising £3,000 by asking friends and family to sponsor her batting for the club last season. These funds paid for the repair and preparation of the Griffin’s second square, so we will have a few grass pitches ready for this summer. A group of under 13s have started another sponsorship drive to fund the batting cages.
If even one in ten of our junior members manages to raise £1,000 through asking friends and family to sponsor a fundraising activity, we’ll reach our target easily. There are lots of ideas on our GoFundMe page.
To make it easier for other juniors (or their parents!) to help out, we’ve created some online sponsor forms (using Google forms) that you can easily download from our GoFundMe page and adapt for yourselves. The sponsors or donors you find can make their payments on that page too.
If you would like to make a donation directly, you can do this through the GoFundMe page. If you are looking to make a significant donation of three figures or more, please do contact Mark Henderson directly on markgfh1@gmail.com, who can arrange for you to make the donation without any administration fees. You can also add yourself as a Griffin fundraiser using this link.
Sponsorship opportunities
We would very much like to find sponsors who would like to fund some of the bigger items on our list, such as covers and the Flicx wickets – both can be made to carry sponsors’ logos. There are also sponsorship opportunities (including shirt sponsorship) available for the Women & Girls section, or for the club as a whole. We will also offer sponsors the opportunity to use the ground – the pavilion is a great place for parties or awaydays, and we can of course organise cricket or football days too. If your business is interested, or if you know of a business that might be, please do let us know.
We are all profoundly grateful for your support, which is so vital as we build this exciting project that has so much to offer to the club and the sport that we love. Thank you.
With very best wishes,
Sean Keaton, Sam Krafft, Graeme Hough, Mark Henderson, Felix Pearce, Rich Baldie, David Moore – the Dulwich CC Griffin Project Team