The water started flowing into the New Road practice area at about 4pm on Monday afternoon, and just kept on rolling. It flooded the entire ground and half the car park, as well as the nearby racecourse, the rowing club and the public footpath – which is now a popular hang-out space for swans. The head groundsman, Stephen Manfield, a man of a remarkably perky disposition, sits on the balcony of the club’s sports bar watching the fourth flood of the off-season do its business, the water coming in from the burst banks of the Severn as well as round the back across the fields. For the benefit of Spin readers he pokes his measuring stick into the water – “four and a half feet in the shallow end”, and still rising.

Last off-season New Road was flooded eight times (enough for the chief executive, Ashley Giles, to question the long-term viability of the club), and the 2024-25 winter is tracking in a similar way. Most floods last nine to 10 days, though this is the highest since Worcestershire’s end-of-season party in September. Manfield stirs the murky water. “It is deep, it is minging, it is unpleasant, but is my job and I love it.”

Worcestershire CCC are not alone. Dan Musson, the head of facilities planning at the England and Wales Cricket Board, has been in touch with 27 clubs so far this storm season, and he is expecting to hear from many more this week as a result of the new year floods and the subsequent snow fall and melt. It is still some way short of 2015-16, the worst year to date, when storms Desmond and Eva blew in and more than 60 clubs were significantly affected, but he’s not making any assumptions.

In December, the Environment Agency published its updated picture of current and future flood and coastal erosion risk in England. It isn’t a pretty read. Climate projections suggest one in four of all homes will be at risk by 2050, along with 46% of the road network, 54% of the railway network, 34% of water pumping stations and 18% of agricultural land. Cricket clubs do not have a magic escape route. A third of recreational clubs are now at risk of flooding, and that number is likely to rise in tune with everything else. Ross on Wye CC are one example. The club are on a flood plain – and historically would have expected to flood once every four to five years. They’ve been under water three times since September – a combination of volume of water and blocked drainage culverts (about which they are in dispute with the council).

The ECB has emergency funding available for those who need it (contact facilities@ecb.co.uk) but the most important thing, Musson urges, is for clubs to register for flood alerts and to make a flood plan.

“The key is to identify risk, create a plan, and work out what actions you will take in the event of a flood and who might take those actions. This might be as simple as moving expensive equipment to a safer place at the end of the season, to longer term projects like sandbagging and flood-proofing buildings.”

Flood proofing is often very expensive and difficult to carry out, and there is no one-size-fits-all solution. In many cases, although a club’s building may not be at risk, the pitch is, and Musson stresses the importance of maintaining culverts and drains so that water can escape. “Often the key is how quickly the water recedes and if there is appropriate drainage and if it is working properly.”

Outside emergency funding, clubs can also apply for flood resilience and protection money through the ECB’s County Grant Funds under the Tackling Climate Change theme. “The impact of climate change affects every club,” says Musson. “Flooding will be the biggest risk to certain clubs in certain parts of the country, but other clubs in other parts of the country are more at risk of drought, and we have even had clubs flooded in areas where a drought order is in place. Essentially, climate change and weather related climactic events can affect clubs in very different ways but across water use, drought risk, flood risk and energy (including carbon reduction) everyone is impacted.”

Corbridge CC, on the banks of the Tyne, were one of those clubs hit by Storm Desmond, the ground inundated with six feet of water after the river rose 24 feet in 20 hours. Their clubhouse was destroyed and they rebuilt two separate buildings: a changing room made out of breeze block and concrete, which is easy to swill out, with electric sockets lifted more than a metre up the walls, and a separate social pavilion that is raised up off the ground. It is a lovely building, and its elevated height makes it fantastic to watch cricket from, but it was hard graft and an expensive business, with funding from the ECB, Northumberland county council, insurance, charitable trusts and private donations.

And, as Musson is evangelical in pointing out, planning is the cheapest thing you can do, as is making sure you are insured, though that is becoming harder as insurers become more canny about flood risk. In those cases, Musson says, “then it becomes all about how you build resilience and weather the experience of flooding. And Worcester is the prime example of that.”

Back then to Manfield and his wellington boots and smelly water. “It’s just disheartening that it is here again,” he says, as he gives a video tour of the flood, “but it is my lot in life now, I think I should grow flippers.”

This is an extract from the Guardian’s weekly cricket email, The Spin. To subscribe, just visit this page and follow the instructions.