Freed from a lifetime of influencing umpires and irritating the opposition, Commercial Manager Gary Dixon has been hard at work over the winter, developing innovative revenue generation schemes.

With a brief to be as creative as possible, Gary has used his worldwide network of business contacts to produce an action plan which is expected to give the club national prominence.

The new tea room has raised our level of expectations and Gary looked specifically at areas of the ground which would benefit from a similar “raising of the bar”.

We are delighted to announce, therefore, that Upton Cricket Club will enter the new 2016 season, powered by 'Motorised Sightscreens and Covers'. Those attending the Natwest CricketForce weekend tomorrow will get the chance to feature on national TV. The popular Sky Sports “Cricket AM” team are sending a crew to film the event and the ever-sporting presenter Sarah-Jane Mee has agreed to don a provocative version of the Upton training kit as she powers to the middle astride our new motorised covers, which will be controlled from the club house.

And the fun doesn’t stop there…………..Chairman Jez Lamb took the opportunity to brief Sky on the many things which make our club unique. After posing against the new sightscreens, with members of the 4th XI performing a training routine not befitting of men of a certain age, Sarah-Jane will move to the tearoom for a dance off against Jay Williams, before retiring to the bar for a well-earned snack of pork pies and multi-coloured shots, served up by Sawda. Throughout the piece, action will be punctuated with highlights from UCC TV 2015 footage. Expect to hear regular roars of “Uppppttoooon” from Don McIntyre and in order to accommodate highlights from PDA Clark’s 1,000 wickets recollections, Cricket AM is thought likely to use our footage in a much extended season opening programme.

Gary would wish all members to thank the sponsoring company from USA. Visitors to www.irbyengineering.com are welcome to view their range of products. Since this venture is, in itself, a move away from their core products we have naturally agreed to support our sponsor by displaying prominent advertising along the bypass reading “Upton CC: Proud to be driven by Irby”. The technology behind the covers and sightscreens was developed by Irby Engineering after Gary put them in touch with Stewart Golf. To thank Stewart Golf, we have agreed that, on the fall of any first team wicket, the sightscreens will display an image of Stewart Golf ambassador Vernon Kay to the accompaniment of a “T20 style” tannoy blast of “Our survey said…..uh, uh”.

Grounds Chairman John Lamb, initially thought to be sceptical, has now fully embraced the technology and has sanctioned a huge Irby logo to appear across the three covers.