The Playing Field

As the dust begins to settle on the car park area here in the village and the Big Day of the New wonderful Annexe grows ever near, our attention now turns to the playing field and its condition.

To remind all of moves over the past three years and more, I detail as follows:

October 2014 – an extraordinary, meeting of the Parish Council was held in the Hall of the Methodist Church, where the case for a takeover of the playing field by the Parish Council was the motion. Many passionate words were presented for the case and the upshot of the meeting was a huge majority of in favour of taking this positive action by a packed room.

The state of the playing field became a very sore subject and as one of the main users I, as Charman of Audlem FC, approached ANSA, whose remit was the upkeep of all such sites in all of Cheshire. The upshot of this lobbying was a meeting set up on site, by Laura Ault of ANSA.I met with Graham Burgess to explain just what we felt were the serious shortcomings.

At that meeting in April of this year, it was resolved that ANSA accepted the poor state needed severe remedial action. As part of the plan, we, as footballers, agreed that we would not play on this surface until November, giving a good 6 months free to aid the works planned.

Accordingly a programme of works was undertaken. Slitting, harrowing, seeding and top soiling. Now – here in November – we have had the field mown and lined. And it must be admitted the surface of the area is much improved with grass all over and of denser nature.

A huge thank you to ANSA and their team.

The planned takeover of the playing field moves along, with the cogs of officialdom grinding exceedingly slow, but hopefully this will soon be a fact -- that the village owns its own vital asset – just as Buerton and Hankelow have.

The first game by Audlem F C will be on the 26th, when we will have the superb luxury of the marvellous facilities in the New Annexe and be able to accommodate visiting teams and officials with much pride. A truly great move forward for this so active community here in Audlem.

The grand opening of the New Annexe on the 18th of this month is a major happening and one that will shout out loud just how superb this village is and with the best community centre for miles around.

Ralph Warburton
Chairman AFC

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