New ground for Hillians?

Burgess Hill Town might not be having a particularly good week on the field, but off it they finally have some positive news. After many years of being unable to get more than a five year lease on their Leylands Park home, which has meant that any ground improvements have had to be self-funded, the Hillians today announced plans for a new three million pound purpose built stadium, with a 3G surface, right next door to their current home.

In a statement on the club website, which you can read in full here, Chairman Kevin Newell has confirmed that after eighteen months of negotiations with developers and sports ground specialists he has been able to propose a scheme which has met with a favourable response from the local council.

He explains:

'The big benefit is that it provides a facility for the community. There’s a lot of football clubs who don’t have adequate training facilities in the Sussex area, certainly where we are. Making that facility available is great for them and it also generates revenue for the football club. New facilities obviously do attract players. They like the idea of something new so that will help us with recruitment.

We want to introduce into that community facility a community cafe and things like that because we’re right on the edge of the Northern Arc development of Mid Sussex council which is going to see another 3,000 houses coming along over the next five years. The majority of which are going to bought by young families and the area around the football club is desperately short of proper community facilities. We will bring that to the community and generally raise the profile of the football club around there to the benefit of everybody of the town.”

Burgess Hill Town play their final league match of the season on Saturday, when they travel to Wingate & Finchley. They then have a Sussex Senior Cup Final against Bognor Regis Town to look forward to, at Brighton & Hove Albion's Amex Stadium on 7th May.