Gloucester has sights set on BBL franchise

Gloucester is aiming to be the next city with a BBL franchise, after Gloucester City football club co-chairman Alex Petheram has become the joint owner of the national league club.

The Division 3 South West side will now be known as the Gloucester City Knights (formerly Glos Knights), as first reported by Gloucestershire Live earlier this year.

“We have aspirations of reaching the British Basketball League (BBL), which is the Premier League for basketball in England and Scotland,” Petheram said at the time.

“The plan will be to have plenty of synergy between the football and basketball clubs and there is a lot of good we can do for the community, especially with a lot of kids needing to be exercising and participating in sport again after this lockdown.”

They are aiming to replicate the Bristol Flyers’ model with Bristol Sport, with synergy between the football and basketball clubs, including branding and sharing of resource such as physios, strength and conditioning coaches and nutritionists.

Petheram is also aiming to build a new purpose-built arena alongside the football club’s stadium in Hempsted.

This week in an interview on the Two Brits One Orange Ball Podcast, it was also revealed that current BBL Show host and former Plymouth Raiders Head Coach Jay Marriot will be involved as CEO of the sporting club, which will be officially announced on June 1.

“I’m gonna go in as CEO of a sports company…that company is aimed to be an umbrella company for the current owners of Gloucester City football club,” Marriott, who is connected with Alex Petheram from his time with the Plymouth Raiders as a player, said.

“…A couple of months ago he (Petheram) reached out to me and started talking to me about the potential of having a BBL and WBBL franchise come to Gloucester and how easy or hard that would be In our conversations and reconnecting there was a bigger purpose for my role, I think, initially it started with me perhaps coming on to just guide the process.

“It looks great, I have to build the partnerships, we’re a long way down the road with educational partnerships and sponsorships and things like that. I’m overseeing the Gloucester City football club structure, and hopefully we’ll be able to bring professional basketball to the city, that would be really great.

“My dad and his family have grown up in Gloucester, it means a lot to me, it’s a project I’m willing to invest in and my family is willing to invest in as well.

“We aspire to be a BBL team, but if we’ve gotta start somewhere, else we’ve gotta start somewhere else, but the finances stack up, the partnerships are there, and the area is thriving for basketball.”

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