We are pleased to announce that we have FINALLY upgraded our main pitch floodlights and
these went live after a two-day installation period for our youth and senior rugby training session tonight. It has been a project we’ve been proactively working on for the last 12 months and we’re extremely excited that this has finally come to fruition.
Replacement of the old halogen lighting heads with modern LED alternatives on our rugby pitch will reduce our energy consumption by approximately 80% representing a huge financial saving for us. The additional revenue we save will allow us to reinvest elsewhere within our community club.

The rugby pitch is presently the only floodlit area of our site which means the pitch is heavily used for midweek training sessions by teams of all ages, youth and senior.
In order to try and reduce the over reliance and heavy wear on the rugby pitch, we are also seeking to install four new smaller floodlights to allow more effective use of our whole site. In the long term this will have a direct impact reducing the wear and improving the condition of our rugby pitch for all of our users.
Unfortunately, we are yet to secure planning permission for the installation of the two new sets of floodlights on our site to illuminate our other training areas. Funding for these schemes has been awarded and negotiations with Northumberland County Council planners are ongoing. Updated lighting designs are being prepared which will hopefully mitigate any detrimental effect upon our neighbours.

Finally, it goes without saying these works wouldn’t have been possible without the direct
financial support of multiple organisations and individuals. Without these generous
contributions all of these works would remain aspirational.

Todays LED upgrade to our main pitch floodlights was largely funded by a grant from Northumberland County Council s.106 Housing Developer Fund. Additional grant awards for the new floodlights have been secured from Sport England, Blyth Town Council and Northumberland County Council (Councillor Jeff Reid)

This is start of the largest development at the club in 15 years, and our biggest upgrade to
our playing facilities in at least 30. Nevertheless, we’re conscious there is still more to do.
Everything will be revealed in the coming months and certainly by the 25/26 preseason
period.

In the meantime, beyond the installation of the new floodlights we continue work behind the scenes on other projects to ensure that soon Blyth RFC will be one of the best places to play sport in South East Northumberland.