Bowls a money-spinner? Maybe not for individuals, but once again, our club has generated a record sum for our designated charity, St Peter and St James Hospice.

The size of the cheque (not literally, but the figures on it) handed over to the hospice’s relationship fundraiser, Wendy Agate, at our presentation tea illustrated how valuable we – and other bowls clubs – are to the local community.

The £1,500 - raised largely from our annual Millennium Cup day, with a generous helping from Nicholas Soames Trophy entry fees and our own prize money from Burgess Hill’s annual fundraising day – represented a 50% increase on the amount handed over last year.

And it delighted Ms Agate, who spelt out how vital public contributions are to the hospice, which serves most of Mid Sussex and neighbouring areas.

She said: “Donations like this are really important to us. The support of our community is what will enable us to provide care for our community now and for generations to come.”

At £19,000 a day to provide its services, and with only 13% funding from government contributions, St Peter and St James relies heavily on the generosity of its neighbours throughout the area it serves – from the edge of Brighton to Forest Row, and including Haywards Heath, Burgess Hill, Uckfield and Lewes.

Ms Agate said: “This year – our 50th - we need £7 million to keep going, so if it wasn’t for the generosity of the community and the incredible work our volunteers do, we wouldn’t be able to provide those services.”

Generous sponsors

If charities need local benefactors, then amateur sports clubs need sponsors, and the Millennium Day event that raised so much of the money handed over by Jill Saunders on behalf of the club was itself funded by our chief sponsor, P & S Gallagher.

We have, of course, also received valuable backing from a number of others (details here).

Before our traditional presentation-day tea, Jill handed out the trophies and medals won in our internal competitions.

Men’s champion Mark Gooch was not there to receive his trophy, won at his first attempt; nor was Anne Bosman, who won the drawn pairs with Mark Howell (who was present), as well as a couple of runners-up trophies.

Linda Huntley was crowned Ladies’ champion for the first time, and John Box and I popped up a couple of times to collect our individual winners’ trophies.

Details of winners and runners-up can be found here.