AN IMPORTANT MESSAGE FROM THE EXECUTIVE OFFICERS OF CHEAM SPORTS CLUB 

This message was sent to the Executive Committee of Cheam Sports Club, i.e. the members you have elected from your section to represent you in Sports Club matters.

Dear All,

We hope by now that you have all had the time to read through the cricketing email tennis that has been on going.

Unfortunately, some hard and heavy decisions had to be made going to protect every section of our Sports Club and the Club as a whole.

This explanation covers what we consider the key points: 

Grounds Contract

As shown in the supporting materials, the aspect of not paying the VAT had to be dismissed towards the end of the first year of the agreement with SJK. This resulted in the contract value actually being £40,000.00 per annum.

This included all basic renovations. 

2021 £40,000.00

2022 £41,600.00

2023 £43,264.00

2024 £44,994.56

2025 £46,794.34

2026 £48,666.11

The above shows a 4% increase a year, if you looked at the predictable and logical increases.

We fully understand that we have not had an increase since the original agreement. A contract length of three years was agreed at £48,000 per annum for the first year and an increase of 3% every year after. This deal, at great value, is an excellent deal. The work load covered is exactly the same as the previous agreement, however the previous agreement was lacking the full detail. All works listed to be completed in the new contract is what was being covered in the previous one. The supporting documentation regarding other local Cricket Clubs proves the contract was negotiated amazingly well between Cheam Sports Club and SJK.

In Section 9 and Section 20 of the Rules you will see that the Executive Officers have operated accordingly within the Rules and Regulations of Cheam Sports Club for the best of all sections and users.

Meeting with Grounds contractor

As mentioned in an email, at the Executive Meeting (which was recorded for the purpose of minutes) it was never agreed to have a meeting with the ground contractor, the Executive Officers and the cricket section. The agreement was made that the Cricket Section could provide a list of questions that they required answering. However, to date, no questions have been received from the cricket section in regards to this matter. The Vice-Chair supplied a great deal of detail and depth in the supporting documentation regarding the major questions that the Cricket Section had already asked.

Rent Agreements

Section 13 of the Rules refers to the section rents. 13.1 lists that the Executive Officers will determine each sections rents for the coming year. We have also provided full and detailed reasoning behind each sections rents that were presented in a spreadsheet style by the Chair. Further documentation and evidence were provided when further questioned by the cricket section. The rent and hire agreement that was offered to the cricket section was at the lower end of market value and we, as Executive Officers, have tried everything to work some way for the cricket section to be able to operate whilst covering their associated costs.

Section 14 within the Rules referrers to rent arrears. The Cricket Section continually state that ‘they have not said that they are unwilling to pay but want further justification’. We have run out of evidence that we, as Executive Officers, can supply as the Cricket Section have had all evidence available. When the cricket chair was challenged, in the last Executive Meeting, to what a fair rent would be for cricket, he responded with “I do not know’.

We also need to share that the cricket section appears to be substantially in arrears in terms of last year’s rent. In such a scenario it falls on the other sections and the Clubhouse to meet the shortfall, particularly ensuring the grounds contractor is paid on time. One other section is in arrears, we will be contacting them shortly, albeit the sum involved is considerably less.

Accounts 

Under Section 19 of the Rules and Regulations, each Section is required to provide Accounts details and any other reasonable information. Continued requests have been made for this from the cricket section. One, poorly produced, set of accounts have been provided but these are now out of date. Further requests for AGM and EGM minutes have also been made with no material provided. The last set of basic accounts were submitted in June 2025 which covered the year ending October 2023. The Section ran at a loss that year of £1,600. Less cricketing activity and outside hire happened in 2024 and even less in 2025. The entire 4 week summer children’s camp was cancelled without notice to the Sports Club due to lack of interest, previously this raised thousands of pounds for the cricket section each year.

A worrying trend seems to be happening when looking from the outside in, even before considering the sizeable number of longstanding cricket members who have departed and explained why.

Cricket Bookings

The cricket section published marketing materials around their open day. No consultation was made with the Sports Club in regards to this. Issues that directly arose were the fact that the date was during the final weeks of the football season, they were promising a BBQ without requesting permission (every other section communicates with the Sports Club and the caterer to confirm permission for their event, provision of food etc) giving away free drinks that were not identified as being purchased through the Clubhouse, having a bouncy castle with no proof of insurance provided and no risk assessment provided for the event.

Merger Rumours

You will recall that the Chair of the cricket section said the cricket section did not want to be at Cheam Sports Club. The rumours of a merger with another local Club have been doing the rounds in the sporting and grounds industry, as mentioned in an e-mail by the Vice-Chair. The cricket committee were requested to comment on this but have so far failed to reply. The local Club has been rumoured as saying that this is not possible for the 2026 season but have not dismissed it for the future.

This means that an educated guess would lead to the cricket committee trying to get through this year and then jumping ship. Agreeing to last year’s rent, would require other sections and the Clubhouse to continue to subsidise the cricket section, until as they said, an agreement can be reached. If the agreement is not reached by the end of the summer and the cricket section departs, then we have all been left picking up the financial weight of the cricket section, the most expensive sport to provide facilities for. This is not an option that can be entertained for the protection of all other sections and the Clubhouse.

Conclusion

This is an extremely sad time but the decisions being made by the Executive Officers are always in the best interests of the Sports Club and its sections. The current viability of the cricket section is in very serious if not complete doubt and with such, heavy subsidy by you and your members of the section can no longer be carried out. The cricket section requested further breakdown of the accounts and investigation into rent reviews at the last AGM and Executive Meetings afterwards. In the Cricket Chair’s own words “each section must pay its way”. The subsequent investigations into costs associated with each sport has resulted in the cricket section not agreeing with the figures, even though these have been backed up with evidence, that you have all been provided with.

The Executive Officers will not let cricket die at Cheam, anything but. We will all rebuild from the ground up and work tirelessly to get an extremely viable cricket section back in play for the summer of 2027 offering all the options other local cricket clubs and sections already provide; women’s, girl’s, mixed, walking, pan-disability, veterans cricket as well as men’s and colt’s cricket.

If we do not act decisively now, we run the risk failing each section and all our members. The Sports Club deserves better, you deserve better and our members deserve better. This cricket situation has delayed all the things we all want to do, in particular the extension project. We therefore still lack acceptable changing facilities for everyone; women, children and pan-disability players in particular.

The Executive Officers, using the Rules have suspended the current Cricket Section from Cheam Sports Club however we wanted to inform you all first with the reasons behind why. The Executive Officers have provided all of the supporting material, offered another way for the Cricket Section to stay on site with the ‘hire’ agreement option, organised and tried the mediated meeting route with the SCF. We have tried everything we can. The Cricket Section have not brought options to the table but always problems. 

The final request of working at last year’s rent agreement leaves the entire Sports Club open for the cricket section to walk away at the end of the season if no agreement is made and an expectation that you and your members will cover the substantial shortfall.

We always act as a democracy and the views of every section and member is important. This decision needed to be made and the Executive Officers have voted to revoke the membership of the cricket section with immediate effect, following the Rules that we have.

We start cricket afresh. We already have interested parties lined up including those who had left our cricket section and vowed never to return. If we did not act decisively in taking this painful but necessary decision, we would run the risk of failing each section and all our members. We do not wish or intend to be in that position.

Yours in sport.

The Executive Officers of Cheam Sports Club