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Skipton, with its rows of independent shops, picturesque houses, outdoor market, stunning views, mills, castle, canal and railway station is a traditional market town in North Yorkshire, once voted the best place to live in Britain!.
The town boasts numerous sports teams and groups, including Skipton Cricket Club. Based at The Sandylands Sports Centre, the club’s membership and junior section has grown significantly over recent years and subsequently was now in need of practice facilities to meet demand. The club contacted Dura-Sport, who visited to the club to provide help and advice.
Whilst initial discussions were centred around the installation of a twin lane project, the club were successful in securing grants from Craven District Council and The England and Wales Cricket Board which, along with their own fundraising and cash reserves, enabled them to add a second twin lane facility, increasing the total number of lanes to four.
With the facility location identified along the edge of the boundary, it became apparent that installing four lanes in a row would encroach too much on to the playing field. Therefore a bespoke design would be required.
Similar to the Dura-Sport facility at Emirates Old Trafford, (used by Skipton born Lancashire CCC Head Coach Glen Chapple and his team), the design at Skipton incorporates four lanes, but with twin lane back to back facilities running the length of the boundary to reduce encroachment. Due to the proximity of the access road and the adjacent rugby field and in order to monitor and prevent unauthorised use, both facilities are fully enclosed and lockable with heavy duty steelwork and an enhanced netting system, with one set of nets at 30.00m length and the second set extended to 33.50m in order to provide additional run ups.
Due to the nets facing north-south in orientation and the square east-west, a semi-permanent sight screen has also been designed and installed along the length of the facility as part of the project.
The batters stand back to back within the two facilities, with a 2.00m wide synthetic grass coaching pathway separating each set of nets. Enhanced DS HD netting is fitted to each cage structure to help to prevent cricket balls from escaping, with access to each set of nets via a synthetic grass access pathway from the hard standing through lockable DDA compliant access gates.
The club opted for The ECB Approved DSi-pro Vision system to be installed in all four lanes. The system is the closest non-turf pitch in the industry in both performance and appearance to a well prepared natural turf wicket, due to its foundation materials and unique loam coloured DSi-weave superior wilton woven cricket carpet with spike resistant technology.
DS Evograss tri-coloured synthetic grass is installed alongside each pitch and within the run up area of the extended facility, again with the aim of replicating a natural turf scenario whilst also providing an area for small sided drills and warm ups.
The project was completed ahead of schedule and within the clubs budget.
A special mention must go to Skipton Cricket Club who were a fantastic client to work with in terms of communication, flexibility and understanding throughout the process - in particular Damian Smith, who project managed the facility on the club’s behalf.
We hope that the club are as proud of the new facility as we are and that it serves the next generation of cricketers for many years to come.
For further information or advice please contact Lee Jacques on 0116 2813200 / lee@dura-sport.co.uk
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