Surrey cricketers on hand for NatWest CricketForce at Purley
Published 9 April 2008
Surrey cricketers and company staff alike were at Purley cricket club last Friday to help out with the club’s building project as part of the ECB volunteer initiative NatWest CricketForce.
Seven members of the Surrey squad including Stewart Walters and England under 19 star, Stuart Meaker were on hand to help the completion of the brand new learning centre at Purley Cricket Club as well as other projects.
In an amazing effort that typifies the nature of the NatWest CricketForce initiative, Purley cricket club managed to knock down an old score box and replace it with a brand new learning centre in just three weeks.
The new development will provide a classroom, IT learning facilities and much more to their resident Academy and youth structure. It will also provide an office for Chris Bullen, Surrey’s Development Manager for the area – meaning that he will be able to base himself at the club creating a greater opportunity for grassroots coaching and development in the outer London boroughs.
As well as helping with the finishing touches of the learning centre, the Surrey cricket volunteers also helped with painting the sight screens and some of the gardening around the outside of the cricket ground. Whilst some of the Surrey squad had paint brushes in hand, others were taking coaching sessions on the outfield for the youngsters from the local community.
Talking about the success of the day, Surrey Development Manager, Paul Taylor said: “I am very pleased at how this year’s NatWest CricketForce turned out. Purley cricket Club put in a tremendous amount of effort and the result over the course of the weekend and the weeks before it, demonstrate exactly why the volunteer initiative is so successful.”
He added: “It was great to have the players and staff down there on the Friday. They got stuck in with the painting and gardening but it was an added bonus for the kids to learn some skills off the professionals.”
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