South London women's football team left without a pitch for the third time in a year

A grassroots women's football team in South London have found themselves without a space to play after their booking with pitch provider Hireapitch was cancelled at the end of March.

South London Laces, established in 2016, have been training at City of London Academy's football pitches in Bermondsey since August last year. They had occupied a weekly Tuesday night slot from 7 to 9pm, welcoming up to 50 players per week.

According to club founder Beth Towle, the Laces had renewed their block booking in March, which would see them through until the end of April. However, the following week, they were informed that the booking had been cancelled, and a corporate men's football league would take the space instead. Others were also affected by the decision, including another women's team and a lacrosse club. South London Laces claim they were given six days' notice, with their next session unable to go ahead.

"Our immediate concern was that we've got up to 50 women training with us. As you can imagine, we needed to find somewhere [to play] immediately," says Beth.

The club had already paid £800 for their block booking in Bermondsey. "[Hireapitch] don't offer refunds – only credit – so we had to look at what they had available. They had a pitch in Streatham on a Wednesday, unfortunately, and they moved us over to that pitch. We weren't happy about it," Beth explains.

A spokesperson for Hireapitch said that the decision was a financial one. "Hireapitch has never fully recovered since Covid 19, having to pay for leases without using them... Hireapitch had to make a financial decision to run football leagues." To compensate the club for the inconvenience of moving to Streatham, Hireapitch stressed that they had discounted the