Marske Junior Badminton Club

Marske Junior Badminton Club in Redcar and Cleveland aims to provide young people of all ages and standards the opportunity to participate in a sporting activity. By involving young people in a healthy sporting activity that will benefit them physically by increased fitness levels, and mentally and technically by teaching them the rules and tactics of the game, the club also hopes it will improve their social skills as they learn to work together as part of a team.

The whole of the junior club is run by volunteers, but this is sometimes limiting as the experience and ability of the coaching team to deliver the appropriate level of training as players improve is stretched. The club recognises it needs to develop the existing volunteers so they can deliver a higher level of coaching, delivering more effective training to players of all ages and standards. To achieve this Marske plans to bring a professional senior national coach in who work with the volunteer coaches over the course of seven months.

David Knights, committee member, said: 'The £1,000 Cash 4 Clubs grant will benefit the club by improving the quality of coaching that our volunteers are able to deliver. We know they can do it and hope speciality training will make the structure of our club even more sustainable. With improved quality and quantity of coaching it will allow us to expand the number of sessions and hours we coach, and also equip the coaching team to build links back into school and help players progress to the Teesside Performance Centre at Thornaby Teesside.'