Anglesea shines a light on its oval conditions

THE Anglesea Football and Netball Club has not switched off its campaign to upgrade lights at its ground, lobbying local and state politicians on the issue.

Polwarth MP Richard Riordan and Surf Coast Shire mayor David Bell were invited to Ellimatta Reserve on Monday to observe the conditions at an all-teams training night, and met with club representatives afterwards.

Anglesea’s lights are rated the equal-lowest in the G21 region (5 out of 15) and the club hopes to upgrade the existing lights from about 35-40 lux to at least the match standard for club competition of 100 lux, and club assistant secretary Ian Poulton said better lights were a priority.

“One of the lights in the north-east corner is out, and it’s like midnight up there.

“The lights are appropriate for some training, but when you look at the lighting at some of the other clubs, you can see that we need an upgrade.”

Last year, the Surf Coast Shire pre-allocated $165,000 from the 2018-19 budget as its contribution to the project and made an application on behalf of Anglesea FNC for $100,000 through the state government’s Country Football and Netball Program.

However, the application was unsuccessful, which Mr Poulton said was very disappointing but that the shire has ringfenced its funding for the project and since re-applied for a grant (on the club’s behalf) from a different state government fund.

He said the outcome would not be known until September, but the club was prepared to wait until the 2019 season to get better lights.

“The shire seems very confident that we’ll be successful this time, so we’ll go in with our fingers crossed.”