AN 'iconic landmark' in Workington will be renamed, as a major broadband company push signifant investment into a town sporting team.

Workington Town’s Derwent Park will now be known as the Fibrus Community Stadium as part of a significant investment in the club by full fibre broadband provider Fibrus.

The company is injecting a substantial sum into the Rugby League club in return for the stadium naming rights.

The partnership was driven by a mutual focus on investing in the local community and the pursuit of improving sport in Cumbria.

As well as stadium naming rights, Fibrus is also taking the front of shirt sponsorship for the newly-formed women’s team and the warm-up jerseys for the men’s side.

Laura Ivison, captain of the new Workington Town Ladies team, said: “It will be an honour to go out there in these shirts and lead the lasses onto the field for the town. It shows girls out there that there is a way forward to play rugby for your local team.”

Carl Forber, the club’s record point scorer, said: “I think it’s a good choice to call it the Fibrus Community Stadium because it literally is a community club with things going on at every home game to involve local people, and I think it’s because it’s such a good community club that I’ve stayed here so long.”

Graeme Peers, Director and Commercial Partnerships Manager at Workington Town, said the cash injection would transform the club: “The deal will allow us to change the business model and help the women’s team get established. We will be able to employ paid professionals on the commercial side and in our community development. We aim to have a representative, a skilled coach, who can work with schools and colleges to nurture young players.”

The launch of stadium signage and official naming of the Fibrus Community Stadium will take effect at Town’s next home fixture, a double header on Sunday, July 9 when the men take on Rochdale Hornets in League One and the women play their first ever competitive home fixture against Newcastle Thunder.

Graeme said: “We’ve been approached about the naming rights before, but it didn’t really fit with what we were trying to do at the club. As soon as we spoke to Fibrus we knew we were on the same wavelength. Fibrus is really focused on community and big on supporting a variety of sports.”

Dean Jooste, Stakeholder Director for GB at Fibrus said “The stadium is an iconic landmark in West Cumbria with deep community roots dating back to the 1950s. The launch of the Fibrus Community Stadium marks an exciting new era for Fibrus and for Workington Town, and we are honoured to be part of this journey.”

Fibrus has demonstrated its support for Cumbrian sport this year by launching a fund for grassroots clubs, which will invest £30,000 in boys’ and girls’ sport in the county, and it recently sponsored the Fibrus 100 girls’ cricket league in partnership with Cumbria Cricket. This investment sits alongside.

Catriona Henry, Sponsorship Lead at Fibrus, added: “We’re thrilled to be partnering with Workington Town. We recognise that sports clubs are at the heart of communities we serve and that’s especially true of Rugby League in West Cumbria.”

“This comes at an exciting time for us, having made over 1,000 homes in Workington available for gigabit capable broadband, and having recently launched our partnership with Cumbria Cricket Girls team, all in the past four weeks. We’re proud to assist the new women’s team and help the club as a whole to thrive.”

Fibrus is transforming the digital infrastructure of rural and regional areas of the UK by investing in excess of £700m to bring full-fibre broadband to homes in towns and villages across Northern England and Northern Ireland. Just recently, the broadband provider connected its first homes in Cumbria under the Government’s Project Gigabit contract.