Cromer Youth Football Club could get first home after 30 years
Councillors have agreed to investigate a potential site
For the past three decades, a football team on the Norfolk coast has been moved “from pillar to post” without having a place to call its own.
But now Cromer Youth Football Club could get its first permanent home after councillors agreed to investigate a potential site for the future.
Cabbell Park in Mill Road has been put forward as an option for the thriving club – a site that was once used by the town’s now-defunct senior team, known as the Crabs.
Cabinet members met to discuss the proposal this week and agreed to explore leasing the ground and making improvements to the site.
Chris Chisholm, the club chairman, said: “The plans are at a very early stage but it is positive news and we have been having lots of constructive dialogue with the council.”
It will be the first time the club, which has been running since the early 1980s, will have its own grounds, having played matches at various sites in the district, including Fearns Field, Nothrepps and East Runton.
North Norfolk District Council has owned the playing field, situated opposite the hospital, since 2015 and a section at the front of the site was later sold to make way for a surgery and pharmacy.
The income from this sale (about £360,000) has been earmarked to be used for improving football facilities in the town and could be put toward making improvements to Cabell Park.
The project will be a further boost for footballers in the town, which is expected to get a new 3G all-weather pitch on land next to Cromer Academy.
It follows a rocky few years for Cromer’s footballing credentials after its senior team withdrew from its league last year due to failing to find a chairman or committee members.
Tim Adams, leader of the council, said it would be a “win-win”, helping cut revenue costs for the maintenance of the grounds and also help give a home to the town’s only football club and enable it to grow in the future.