Who are we?
Battersea Wanderers Hockey Club is a friendly, fun and competitive hockey club based in South West London. We run six men’s and seven ladies sides playing across the London Hockey Leagues. We also have three mixed teams who play friendly games on Sundays.
At Wanderers, we cater for a wide range of abilities in an enjoyable atmosphere, while providing training and coaching to help develop our teams and individuals. So whatever your ability or aspirations, you will find Wanderers the fun and friendly environment you’ve always wanted to play hockey in! What are you waiting for?
Why Join Wanderers?
Reasons our members give for joining include the great team atmospheres, a friendly and social club, amazing club house, crazy fancy dress themed socials, the fiercely competitive fees and the fact that as a Wanderer you feel part of a club, not just a team.
Trials are held each summer in early August. Dates will be shared in good time for next year! We’re currently mostly fully stocked with players, but sometimes have spaces due to changes in availability, so please send us a message if you are interested in coming along. There’s obviously a range of standards across the club, so hopefully will be somewhere just right for you!
We look forward to hearing from you.
Find out more:
Follow us on Instagram page for the latest club news, banter, gossip and photos! We’d also love to answer any questions you have – just drop us a note here. And if you are interested in joining us, please fill in this form here and we’ll register you for trials or else try and invite you down to a taster session!
Our History
Wanderers Hockey Club was founded in 1979 by a collection of sporting demi-gods somewhere in South West London. Since then, the club has experienced good times and bad, the happy and the sad, seen members come and go, and in some cases, come back again. And along the way, it was decided that the finest hockey is played in raiment of Jacaranda and Buttercup.
A wandering history of the club is in the works and will be on the website sometime soon!
League Hockey
Our league sides play their hockey matches on Saturdays from the end of September until about the end of March. Pre-season training usually begins mid-August, with the odd warm up game in earlier September. Home games are played at Battersea Park and Kennington Park (see Find us for full addresses). Teams do general practice/training once a week (Monday-Wednesday evening, team-dependent), generally at Battersea Park Astro. Some of our keen teams even do some fitness training too!
Trophies
Whilst Wanderers Hockey Club primarily aim to provide enjoyable hockey and a good culture, we have also seen numerous successes on the field! A selection of these winning teams are pictured below, and once fully updated, will show a real mix of teams, levels and decades!
Mixed, Social and Summer Hockey
Mixed Hockey:
We have three mixed teams (Sinners, Optimists and Daqs) that play in the Battersea Park Mixed League. Matches are played every other Sunday during the season (Oct-March) and all current members of Wanderers are welcome to play. In summer, we have weekly Wednesday night mixed games at Battersea Park and Sunday mixed games at Kennington Park. After a successful 2023 entry into the England Hockey Mixed Championship, where we played well, getting ourselves within only about 8 rounds of the final… we are again entering and looking forwards to a successful 2024-25 cup run!
Summer Hockey:
During the off-season, members can enjoy relaxed, midweek mixed social hockey for free. These are held at 8-9pm on Wednesdays at Battersea Park, running from May to end of July. Depending on how many people turn up, the format may be 6-a-side on half a pitch or 11 (or more!)-a-side on a whole pitch. You’ll need to bring a dark and white T-shirt. Pop us a message and come along!
Socials
Club Colours and Kit
Our official club colours are jacaranda and buttercup (though our more experienced members and veterans will remark that this looks more like purple and gold these days!). We just have one kit, given the lack of clashes… Shirts are as below, our socks are very stylish with purple and yellow hoops. We wear dark (black or navy) shorts and skirts/shorts/skorts, which don’t have to be club-branded but can be!
All our teams wear this same kit, made by Canterbury. All members are able to order playing kit and an extensive range of other club kit on our online store. If you are new to the club, please ask your captain to send your details to Sophie (kit sec) to be allocated a number for you to order on the back of your playing shirt.
Delivery
Free delivery on orders of £60 and above.
Kit ordering windows
We no longer have to order within prescribed kit windows, though some orders may be bunched up and processed together (i.e. start of season!). If you are new, please have your captain ask Sophie to kindly assign you a unique shirt number, before you order. Thanks!
Fees
We pride ourselves in keeping costs as low as possible. There are two general costs for league players: an annual membership fees (covering all club membership, training, summer evening hockey) and match fees.
Annual membership fees for 2024-25 are £220, with concessional membership fees (for goalkeepers, full-time students and those in unemployment) being £140.
Match fees are managed locally within teams, and will be approximately £6 for each match you play. These are collected at the end of each half of the season.
Mixed hockey doesn’t require a membership (though most mixed players are also members) and just involves a match fee (currently £6) being paid per game you play.
Affiliations and Governance
Get involved!
All members can attend and vote at the club’s annual general meeting (in the off-season) where they can also volunteer for a multitude of committee positions. As a not-for-profit organisation, everyone involved in the running of the club is a volunteer – we pay our coaches for their time but we think that’s a worthwhile investment!
Affiliations:
Battersea Wanderers HC is affiliated to England Hockey, the governing body for hockey in England.
England Hockey: Governance, Rules, Duty of Care, and Inclusion
