FOOTBALL will remain in Basingstoke with a more community-based focus after terms were agreed for Basingstoke Town Football Club (BTFC) to move to a new ground.

The club has been working closely with Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council and the Hampshire FA to secure its future in the town.

At the cabinet meeting, the borough council agreed to provide Hampshire FA with a 75-year lease for site at Winklebury which includes a requirement for Hampshire FA to provide a home for BTCFC.

This includes the provision to upgrade the pitch to artificially 3G turf so the facilities can be used by the wider community as well as the club.

At the meeting cabinet member for communities and community safety, Councillor Simon Bound, said: “Basingstoke Town Community Football Club has been established to seek a secure future for the town’s premier football team as well as to support its youth and community football development programmes.

“By agreeing this proposal there will be an improvement for high quality football facilities in our town.”

Having been agreed by the cabinet, BTFC will move into the Winklebury ground once all ground grading works are completed and the necessary transfer of ownership of the team to a community club basis takes place.

Club secretary Steve Williams said: “This is an important first step, not just in securing senior football in the town, but we are now in a position to help football grow in the community.” With the club now having the green light to move to a new home, opposition councillors asked what the plans for The Camrose site were, of which the borough council owns 29 per cent.

South Ham ward councillor Sean Keating urged the cabinet to not allow high density housing to be built on the site, while Overton, Laverstoke and Steventon ward councillor, Cllr Ian Tilbury, asked for the money to be reinvested back into the football club.

After plans for BTFC to move to the Old Common in Eastrop were thrown out in 2016 and Rafi Razzak stepping down as chairman, there was much debate about the club’s future.

However, cabinet member for planning and infrastructure, Cllr Mark Ruffell, said he is glad to finally see a deal being agreed.

Cllr Ruffell added: “We at the council have been criticised for sometimes kicking the football club into the long grass, but now the ball is firmly in the centre of the pitch.”