BADSHOT Lea Football Club are close to ending their “nomadic” existence by moving into a new ground.

Lea, who ply their trade in the Premier Division of the Combined Counties League, have effectively been living out of a footballing suitcase for the past decade.

A series of groudshares everywhere from Farnborough to Camberley has been part and parcel of life at Badshot Lea.

But that’s all set to change with the club ready to start life in a ground they can call home in Wrecclesham, near Farnham, in time for next season.

“It’s been a long journey but we’re on the final stretch now and we will be kicking a ball in anger in Wrecclesham in 2019,” said chairman Mark Broad, who has been at the helm for the past 11 years.

The move to the new ground, which is expected to have cost around £750,000, has been long overdue but is something Broad has set his heart on for quite some time.

“When I was first in the job we were playing at Badshot Lea recreation ground which is a nice little facility, but if you’ve got ambitions to move the club forward the first thing you have got to do is secure facilities and then get them right.

“So the first job was finding a ground that we could develop, but when you’re in green belt in Surrey it’s not easy. So we had a chat with Farnborough Town and agreed a groundshare and that enabled us to start moving up the pyramid,” explained Broad, who hails from Tongham.

Lea’s link up with Farnborough Town began a succession of such temporary moves with the club pitching their tent at Godalming Town, Ash United and Camberley’s Krooner Park, where the club currently play their home games.

“To be brutally honest, it makes me wonder how we have survived at all of those facilities over all those years because we haven’t had an income stream,” said Broad, who explained that the club has to pay a groundsare fee to their hosts but can only generate cash on the gate and through programme sales on match days.

Most clubs, he said, make their money through the clubhouse bar – something Lea haven’t had access to as a paying guest in other teams’ grounds.

But the move to Westfield Lane in Wrecclesham, the former home of Farnham Rugby Club, will change all that with a fully-functional clubhouse, complete with business wi-fi, a big part of the project.

Planning permission was granted by Waverley Borough Council in 2014 before groundwork began in earnest in April 2017. Construction of the clubhouse followed in May 2017 before the pitch seeding began last May. The floodlights were erected last August and the stand went up in September.

The ground is expected to have a standing and seating capacity of around 1,200.

The lion’s share of the funding, according to Broad, has come from bodies such as the Football Foundation and Sport England, as well as private investors.

“A lot of people assume that once you’ve got planning permission that you are there, but of course the planning permission is just the first part. You’ve then got to convince the funders that you have got a project that is deliverable and sustainable. It’s been a journey without a doubt.”

Initially the club had hoped to be in situ before Christmas but a combination of poor weather and pitch issues have pushed the project back a few months as they are now in the hands of the pitch contractor which needs to insert secondary drainage and back fill the slicks with sand which will hugely help with the drainage of the playing surface.

“When that is done and they are happy they will be able to sign off on the pitch and we’ll be ready to go,” said 54-year-old Broad, who added that the facility has one main pitch and two 9x9 grass pitches, with potential for more external pitches which can be used by some of the 30 junior teams attached to the senior football club.

“The only negative for us was that it wasn’t in Badshot Lea village, but I believe we have created a positive because we’ve already embraced Wrecclesham and we’ll be looking to become part of the community and get local people involved. It will give us the opportunity to finally put down some roots.”