Winter Sports - Rugby


It is often said that wedded couples need to put in some hard work to avoid a divorce but, when two sports clubs in Northern Ireland merged to share their grounds, it proved to be a real marriage of convenience. Now, with the honeymoon period well and truly over, Chris McCullough headed north from Belfast to find out how two distinct clubs have settled into a harmonious existence


F


or the past ten years, Templepatrick Cricket Club has been renting grounds at Ballyclare Rugby Club in County Antrim in a shared environment and, so far, the


venture has gone without a hitch. Thanks to two different seasons, the


pitches at the club on the Doagh Road have time to recuperate somewhat from a hectic rugby season before the cricketers start their games. There may be a short overlap between the rugby and cricket games’ calendar, but with two sets of groundsmen looking after the pitches, they always receive the best attention. Ballyclare Rugby Football Club was formed back in 1949 and currently boasts around 600 members of all ages. The club, known in its early days as The Ballyclarians, operates four senior teams, a youth section, a very strong mini rugby section as well as a disabled initiative.


Sitting amongst the idyllic thirty-eight


acres of grounds is the clubhouse, which was officially opened in 1992 by Arthur Foweather MBE, the founder of The Old Ballyclarians Association. The club is home to four full size playing


pitches - the Lindsay, Coulter, Moore and Russell, plus a fully floodlit training area for rugby. An area between two of the pitches is


dedicated for the cricket square, rented out and maintained by Templepatrick Cricket Club since 1996. Ladies are also welcome at both clubs and


already they play both cricket and rugby at the grounds. With this in mind, there are separate facilities in place in the clubhouse which is equipped with six male changing rooms, a private referees changing room with showering facilities, and a ladies changing area. The Templepatrick Cricket Club was


founded in 1969 and subsequently played for


PC FEBRUARY/MARCH 2017 I 57


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