FIVE years of hard work and community spirit came to fruition on Saturday when a Lostock-based amateur football team opened its new sports centre.

Ladybridge FC marked the opening of the £500,000 centre with a match against a team of ex-Wanderers stars.

Bolton's Olympic boxing silver medallist Amir Khan was also there to lend his support as the club celebrated the opening of the centre.

It includes eight mini-pitches, a clubhouse, changing rooms and parking spaces.

And its completion is a triumph for the determination of those involved with the club.

Parents spent more than a year clearing the site of rubbish, and even emptied two drug dens of beer cans and used syringes.

Their efforts have now been rewarded with the opening of the centre, which will benefit the club's 350 members -- who play in 26 teams across eight leagues -- as well as the community.

Chairman Steve Hill was one of six trustees who launched the project in February 1999, then secured money from the FA Youth Trust and several other charities to ensure that it was built.

Ladybridge had been looking for a permanent home for years, and secured a 50-year lease on the Tempest Way site in 2002 -- then gained planning permission for the project.

The Football Association has classified the club's new home as a county-standard mini-soccer centre and the children will be able to host an FA festival of football for teams across Lancashire.

Hill said: "The whole project has been made possible by the voluntary work of the people involved in it. There are half-a-dozen people who have really worked their socks off for this, and so many more who have helped along the way."

"We're all delighted that this project, which we started way back in 1999, has become a reality."