The video begins with presenter Radzi Chinyanganya stood on a bowling green in front of a clubhouse, wearing a Team England Commonwealth Games jacket. He talks over some funky, drum-based background music.
Radzi says: “Welcome to Malmesbury Bowls Club, aka the premises with the friendliest people on planet Earth.”
During this sentence, we see shots of several bowls club members waving to camera and Radzi smiling.
We then cut to fast-paced shots of an electric taxi decorated with Team England ‘Ready to win’ decals, a motorway exit sign for Mansfield and an animated map graphic showing the taxi making its way from London to Bath, Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester and Leeds, ending with a text slate reading ‘The King’s Baton Relay’ on a background pattern resembling crumpled paper.
Radzi is chatting to a member of the bowls club, club secretary Alan Rice-Smith, on the green. As he talks, we see general views of the bowls green and a wading bird on the adjacent river.
Radzi says: “Alan, this place is absolutely stunning but if we were stood here – it’s May now – in the depths of winter, what would it look like then?”
Alan says: “It would look a completely different picture to what we can see today. We have beautiful surroundings for a game of bowls, as you can see at this time of year. If you look down at the stream, it’s pretty low-level, running smooth and serene as it passes the club.”
More scenes of the gentle river running beside the club.
Alan continues: “But in winter, and if I was to refer back to the last big winter problem we had – November 2024, Storm Bert produced water that was beyond the level of this path.”
We see shots of Alan and his fellow committee members looking and pointing at videos of their flooded bowling green on a TV screen.
Alan says: “This flood plain field was completely covered in water and there was high-speed water flowing down the river towards this bend in the top corner, coming round and washing mud and silt and debris across our green and into the clubhouse.”
We see the river bending underneath a bridge next to the bowls club and Alan indicates where it entered the bowling green.
Alan says: “That’s how big an impact one of the major storms that comes through the country can have on any area, and particularly for us.”
Radzi says: “Sport England – how important have they been?”
Alan says: “Sport England has provided fantastic support for this club, going back to 2018. The club had to make some difficult decisions, as to whether we should reinstall another grass green, knowing its vulnerability, or to go to this artificial green that we chose.”
We see slow-motion shots of club members talking in the clubhouse, a sign on the wall that reads ‘The Landfill Communities Fund supporting the new green for Malmesbury Bowls and Social Club’, and close-ups of bowls on the green.
As Radzi is shown in slow-motion bowling on the green, he says: “So essentially, without Sport England, potentially there would be no bowls taking place here.”
Alan says: “With Sport England’s financial support and understanding of our plight back in 2018 – they’ve significantly supported us, I understand to the tune of about £90,000, they’ve assisted us, along with other sponsors, to get our club into this position.”
We see a shot of Denise Ludlam, Sport England’s strategic lead for environmental sustainability, walking across a bridge. She’s then shown talking on screen beside the bowls club.
Denise says: “Sport England is helping communities all across England with the Movement Fund, which will fund clubs to improve their facilities and prepare them for a changing climate, to protect our sport and enable participation for everybody.”
Denise is shown laughing with other club members stood on a railing next to the green.
Denise continues: “Malmesbury Bowls Club nearly didn’t exist because of flooding. The future of sport is threatened by our changing climate and we need to protect it so people can continue to play sport now and in the future. We need to prepare for the future to protect sport for all.”
As the music fades in, the video ends with another shot of the bowls club members waving to camera as it moves back and away from them, before a final text slate reading ‘The King’s Baton Relay’ is shown, along with the logos of Team England, The National Lottery and Sport England.
