Valley End CC: Cricket and Nature in Harmony
By Tanya Aldred
Life is busy. Running a cricket club takes an army of volunteers to sort out the nets, cut the grass, organise colts’ sides, staff the bar. Supporting nature and saving carbon, however vital, can feel like another box to tick, but not if you’ve got a Marcus Fagent – groundsman, tree planter, seed sower and more at Valley End CC.
Valley End, in Surrey, has 600 members, from five to 78 years old, and men’s, women’s, boys, girls, disability and walking cricket sides. It also won the Ortus/Cricketer’s Greenest Ground competition in 2022 – and Fagent has continued to work towards making the ground more inviting, both to wildlife and humans, and to reduce emissions.
He has planted mature trees – lime, oaks, maple and others - and set up an outdoor classroom surrounded by a copse of young silver birches. He sowed a wild flower seed bank at the back of the bund which protects the club from the roar and fumes of the M3. He’s built a zig zag path up the bund to encourage people to explore the ground, and left some ground wild. He is composting grass cuttings which, in time, will be used in place of synthetic fertilisers.
The club have installed 52 solar panels on the roof of the pavilion, with batteries in the basement, which will save £7,000 a year. For clubs wondering how they could afford the initial sum – they were able to get a £10,000 grant from Surrey CCC and £10,000 from Surrey Heath, and borrowed the rest. They also applied for a grant from Aviva, which paid for an electric tractor which they now power from the electricity generated from the solar panels.
Fagent has more up his sleeve – he is keen to plant more trees, more wild flowers, and to buy an electric roller. He wants to create a woodland walk in an adjoining oak wood and expand on the outdoor classroom with a learning garden, where he can grow crops for cricket teas (reinstated a couple of years ago). And to put up a net screen to protect animals grazing in a next-door field, and to extend composting. For that, the club needs money, and they are crowdfunding - with members invited to sponsor a solar panel, or a tree - and Aviva matching any donations.
Finally, the most difficult bit, he’s hoping to engage and encourage more club members to be involved with the project. To persuade them that getting your hands dirty is worthwhile and brings its own joy.
Marcus can be found on TikTok as the ungrumpy groundsman, and here he is explaining the club’s plans on Youtube:
The Next Test is a non-profit, volunteer organisation working to promote climate action and sustainability in and through cricket.
