At the start there were only 12 players with an age range of 15 to 20. The main opposition was the army plus a few scattered local teams.

It was decided in the beginning that the club would have a committee made up of Chairman, Vice-Chairman, Secretary and Treasurer and these positions would be filled each year by way of votes from club members, this sound base has contributed to the success of the club.

The first team began playing matches at Tongham Junior School although the playground was not large enough for a full sized court. Because of this it was decided to fund raise to provide a tarmac facility and together with a grant from the local council eventually a full size court was built in the recreation ground in Tongham. During the summer, a regular annual tournament was held when it was necessary to also mark out a grass court.

The club has been successful at promoting netball in the area and were instrumental in forming the Surrey and Hants Border League together with other local clubs.

Original club members, Maggie Smith, Val Cooper and Jan Thompson are still with the club today and remember the times when the only way to get to a match was to catch a bus, hitch hike or in later years cram all seven players into Maggie’s little car.

The kit has also changed over the years initially white skirts and blue shirts were worn with a navy blue tracksuit – these have now evolved to the green and yellow kit that we have today.

Tongham Netball Club has come a long way from its humble beginnings and has been involved in lots of memorable events. The first team qualified for the regular Wembley event on many occasions and have been winners and runners up. The club have been fortunate to have members represent National, Regional and County sides on a regular basis. Back in 1975 Maggie, Val, Jan and Pam linked with Berkshire players to represent Bracknell in the BBC programme ‘Sportstown’. An exciting match ensued with a draw 10-10 against a team from Milton Keynes. It was a very rare occurrence at the time for netball to be televised! Tongham are also very lucky to have Bill Alexander – International Umpire within our club.

In 2006, after some tense play-off games, Tongham were successful in securing a place in the National Premier League, where only the top 20 clubs in England take part. During 2007, we were featured every day for a week on the Edith Bowman show on Radio 1, with members of the club selecting their favourite songs and talking about netball.

Sadly, Kay Morrison has now passed away, but due to her initial enthusiasm and sound advice Tongham Netball Club lives on, she would be very proud of the success achieved. Tongham teams currently participate in the National Premier League, South Region League, Berkshire Premier and Hampshire Premier Leagues.

We recently celebrated our 40th anniversary… .quite an achievement…….we're looking forward to another 40!