An agreement between Abbeycroft Leisure and Ormiston Academies Trust has been finalised today, which will once again allow the community to use the facilities at Sudbury Sports Centre including the sports hall, gymnasium, squash courts and the Curve.
The centre has been temporarily closed since 31 August this year, as Ormiston Sudbury Academy took the decision to carefully review the future of the facilities in the context of the pandemic and uncertainty about what recovery would look like.
Since the closure, Abbeycroft Leisure, as well as Babergh District Council, have been in discussion with Ormiston Sudbury Academy to find a way for the centre to reopen.
This new agreement will see the facilities available on a demand-led basis for an initial 6-month period starting from 22 November. The sports centre will open with limited hours on Monday and Thursday evenings as well as Sunday mornings.
Running costs for the interim period are to be supported by Ormiston Academies Trust and Babergh District Council and discussions are now continuing about the long-term future of the site beyond May 2022.
Warren Smyth, Chief Executive of Abbeycroft Leisure said:
“We are extremely pleased that we can continue to provide the opportunities for the local community to stay active by offering excellent services and facilities and we look forward to continuing our discussions with partners about the future of the sports centre.”
“We have informed regular users of the centre and other key stakeholders about the booking availability and would urge any other groups or organisations to get in touch as soon as possible, given that we have limited hours to offer.”
Caroline Wilson, Principal of Ormiston Sudbury Academy, said:
“We have always been clear in our aspirations to provide our students, and our community, with high-quality sports facilities
“We are proud of our strong community links, and we know the important role our Sports Centre and associated facilities hold in the local area. We are therefore very pleased that this offer can continue, and look forward to seeing members of the public benefiting from our facilities once again.
“We will continue to work closely with our partners throughout the re-opening, whilst continuing our active discussions around the long-term future of the site, and our ambitions to improve the facilities so they are as good as they can be, for everyone.”
Cllr John Ward, Leader of Babergh District Council, said:
“Ensuring our residents can live happy, healthy and active lives is a vital part of our Covid recovery, and a keystone of both our Wellbeing and Leisure, Sport and Physical Activity Strategies.
“We are, therefore, delighted to be able to support our partners to enable the re-opening of these facilities, to help meet the needs of local residents and ensure everyone can stay as fit and healthy as possible.”
Enquiries about the sports centre should be directed to Abbeycroft Leisure at https://www.acleisure.com/contact-us/
Member information
Unfortunately, the fitness suite will not reopen to the public at this time, we apologise for this.
Any members who transferred their membership to Kingfisher Leisure Centre gym can continue to use Kingfisher.
We will however, reopen our main sportshall, gymnasium and squash courts at Sudbury Sports centre for block booking or pre-booked casual court hire.
You will need to pre-book your activities e.g. squash, badminton, 5-aside football and table tennis online, via our app or by calling our customer contact team on Tel. 01284 757473.
The easiest way to book is using our Abbeycroft App and choose the centre Kingfisher Leisure Centre where Book Courts will be available for you to easily book.
For block booking enquiries please contact our team by email on bookings@acleisure.com.
Please take into account the Christmas closure will include the following dates; Monday 20 December – Sunday 2 January. Reopening Monday 3 January 2022.
If you have any questions, such as needing help with your online booking account, please get in touch here.