Facilities campaign latest: Birmingham

Club Website hit the road last weekend to check out some of the poorest football facilities in the Birmingham area. We visited two of the worst spots in the city and spoke to people who use the facilities week in, week out.

Here we bring you a run-down of the day, a load of photos of the facilities in question and the thoughts of those who use them.  What we found wasn't pretty but, unfortunately, sounds fairly representative of the standard of facilities that many people have to put up with across the country.

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Back to my roots - Steve Claridge

Steve Claridge played for no less than 20 football clubs in a career that spanned the tiers of English football from the Southern League to the Premier League league and saw him playing beyond his fortieth birthday.

Now a respected pundit on BBC television and radio, Claridge is continuing a love affair with the game that began as a young boy playing for his dad's side, as we found out when we took him back to his roots.

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Marshalling the midfield with Gary Speed

December sees one of the true legends of the game sharing his knowledge with amateur footballers. Gary Speed’s master class on being a midfield craftsman is now available to download from the Lucozade Sport football website.

There’s also the chance to win one of 200 cases of Lucozade Sport Body Fuel to help your midfielders cover more yards in December.

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Graham Poll on the spot!

Have you ever wished that you had TV cameras at your games so that you could just hand back to the studio to review the big decision that turned the game? Alas, top pundits don't usually concern themselves with football at amateur level... unless you're with Club Website of course!

We've got top ex-referee Graham Poll casting his eye over your refereeing queries so, if you've seen an unusual decision in your match or have a query on the Laws of the Game, email it to grahampoll@clubwebsite.co.uk.

The best questions are answered here in The Club House every month, while the pick of the bunch wins a personal signed copy of Graham's new book, 'Geoff Hurst and the Hand of God'.

This month's top questions

Fields in Trust

We know how important playing fields are to sport. Fields in Trust - founded as the National Playing Fields Association in 1925 - is the only national charity working to protect and improve these vital spaces to ensure that future generations have access to outdoor spaces for sport and play.

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Win an England DVD this Christmas!

World Cup fever has stepped up a notch or two in the last week, with Fabio Capello's England getting a pretty favourable draw for next summer's festival of football in South Africa.

To help get all you England fans out there in the mood, we're giving away six copies of England's Road to South Africa on DVD - the official & exclusive story of England’s World Cup qualifying campaign!

With every goal and the best action from all 10 qualification games, plus exclusive interviews with John Terry, Wayne Rooney and Capello himself, this DVD would make a fantastic Christmas present for any England fan... or you could just keep it and treat yourself!

Enter here

Competition winners

In the last month we've given away six copies of PES 2010 and 10 pairs of Sealskinz waterproof football socks. Congratulations to all our winners!

PES 2010 winners: Hashim Moahmmed (Red Juniors FC), Danny Brown (Inter Blades FC), Nathan Burke (Abbeyside AFC), Harrison Green, Jason Hughes (Foxhole AFC), Liam Tring (Hadley Rangers FC)

Sealskinz winners: Ryan Grime (Bare FC), Faisal Khurshid (Woking & Maybury Sports Club), Darren Topps, Wesley Cummings (CAS Bury), Callum Hoare (Hillingdon Borough FC), Lynn Waller, Anthony Roberts (Sherwood Achilles FC), David Parker, S Jensen (Buckhaven Town AFC), Ross Tabor (Abingdon Town FC)

Club Website's BIG Christmas giveaway!

Keep your eye out next week for Club Website's Christmas cracker of a competition. This festive feast will include a bundle of treats straight from our Christmas stocking, including top Premier League tickets, footballs, books and enough football kit to make Santa look like Scrooge!

All the details will be published on our competitions page on Friday 17 December and the competition will run throughout the festive period until we meet again here in The Club House in the New Year... so check back into Club Website over the holidays and kick off 2010 with a bang!

Club Website monthly round-up

Loads going on at Club Website in the last month, as ever. Our nutrition section - new this season - continues to prove very popular, so check out December's nutrition advice, which is live now on your club website.

With our facilities campaign moving on apace, we've been keeping you all up-to-date with the latest plans via updates on Club Website as well as our Facebook and Twitter pages. Our latest poll on the issue found that a whopping 60 percent of Club Website users who rent their pitch and facilities from the local council do not get value for their money.

Like many of you out there, we were pretty outraged by the Hand of Henry incident in Paris, so we ran a poll to find out if cheating is just part of the game these days. Whilst obviously true for some, a clear majority of you - 64 percent of you - say there is no place no cheating in the beautiful game.

And finally... Happy Christmas!

The Club Website Team would like to take this opportunity to wish you all a very merry Christmas and a happy and prosperous new year!

Thanks for all of your input over the last 12 months. 2009 has been an exciting year for Club Website and, with lots of developments in the pipeline, 2010 promises to be even better. We couldn't do it without your valuable feedback and support though, so please keep it coming and we'll keep striving to improve your football experience.

The Club House will be back with more top features, interviews and competitions in the new year, so until then... have a great festive season and we'll see you back here in 2010!