Basketball club Caledonia Gladiators are set to move to East Kilbride by 2024, Lanarkshire Live understands.
Formerly known as Glasgow Rocks, the club underwent a name change last month in a bid to attract a wider audience and now they are set to leave their current base in Glasgow’s Emirates Arena for a new home.
Club owners Steve and Alison Timoney own Playsport in the South Lanarkshire town and it has been mooted that is the likely destination of a state-of-the-art, purpose built arena.
Gladiators coach Gareth Murray would not be drawn on where their next destination lies, but told Lanarkshire Live it would be a massive step for the club to have their own facility.
Murray says the club have been looking for their own home for at least 10 years, and this proposal would allow them to grow.
And he hopes it ultimately leads to Caledonia Gladiators becoming the biggest and best basketball club in the UK.
Murray, 38, from Rutherglen, said: “This is a good move. New ownership has come in that own the women’s team, they own the men’s team now, they’ve changed the name to Caledonia Gladiators and hope to move to a state-of-the-art arena in the next 18 to 24 months.
“The place is still to be decided, exactly where it’s going to be, but it’s exciting news for the club.
“Having our own facility is what we’ve been needing for the last 10 years at least, and now there’s the possibility of big plans of moving somewhere that we can call our own home.
“You’re in control of when you play your games, when your teams practice, how much community programmes can you be involved in, in your facility, and the whole pathway.
“It would allow everybody to get behind the Caledonia Gladiators brand, as well.
“We would be in charge of the facility and we could grow the club, with the grassroots in the community and pro teams as well.”
The club had a long-mooted move to Easterhouse in mind, but that has since been taken on by Basketball Scotland, and Murray says the plans will benefit the entire sport in Scotland.
He said: “The owners are moving away from the ‘Glasgow’ name because they want to represent the whole of Scotland.
“We want to represent Scotland. We want to get to all the clubs across Scotland and grow basketball, not just the Caledonia Gladiators part, but the whole of Scottish basketball as well.
“If we do have to move outside of Glasgow it’s just because of space, rather than wanting to move out of Glasgow.
“We’re still going to be doing a lot of work in the Glasgow community, that’s been the base here since 2003, and we want to grow all the stuff we’ve been doing, incorporating more youth basketball within the programme.
“I know in the women’s team they already have the pathway with the 12s, 14s, 16s, 18s, seniors and the pro team now, whereas the men’s team haven’t got that full pathway yet, which is really important for us.
“We want to get into all the primary schools, get back into that community and the things we used to do.
“It’s also about growing the professional team as well, we want to get more sponsors involved. We want to be the biggest and the best club in the whole of the UK.”
Murray added: “It’s about more people playing basketball, trying to bring through the next generation of young players, and we have to start at a young age.
“We have to get them excited about basketball when they’re six, seven, eight years old, make sure we’re coaching them and they’re having fun playing basketball, and something they can continue to do.
“Hopefully we’ll see some players coming all the way through the pathway up to the professional team and that’s not something that’s done overnight, that’s an at least 10-year programme that’s going to have to take place for that to happen.
“When the new ownership took over, the Easterhouse bid was still in and Basketball Scotland have that now. They’ll start doing their programmes in the Easterhouse area, which is great for basketball as well.”
Follow Lanarkshire Live Sport on Twitter via @LanLiveSport, like us on Facebook or find us on Instagram for the latest sports news, pictures and video.
