London football club Charlton Athletic, currently competing in the League One Playoffs, have officially opened their Cyberlabs Gaming Box inside the team’s home ground, The Valley, and have begun taking bookings.
Announced earlier this year, the dedicated gaming and entertainment space is located in the Alan Curbishley Stand and faces the pitch, allowing for “unique gaming and football experiences.” The renovated box space has been kitted out with gaming equipment provided by partners, including PS5s, multiple screens, the PSVR2, two UNEVN PC Gaming desks, X Rocker chairs, Corsair peripherals, and a X3000i BenQ projector. Otherwise, the box has a couple of sofas and is carpeted to give a more relaxed and comfortable lounge-like feel to the room.
The box will function as a media space for the club and will help support the work of the award-winning Charlton Athletic Community Trust. It also offers a new revenue stream for the club, with bookings available on both matchdays and non-matchdays. The website is currently taking enquiries for the space to be used for matchday packages for both kids and adults, esports bootcamps, children’s birthday parties, a space for content creators to stream or record, and other events including business meetings and even weddings.
Sam Cooke, who previously founded the Esports Insider, is one of the three London-based cofounders of Cyberlabs alongside Ed Kim, the CEO of New Meta Gaming Arena, and Abdiqani Ahmed, who founded the Lionscreed organisation which was removed from the NLC and UKEL last year. Cooke is a lifelong Charlton fan and shared his excitement about the box opening: “We’re really happy to have the box now ready to go and get the first fans in. The Northampton match was a fantastic debut for the box (the massive three points certainly helped), and we’re looking forward to the space being used regularly.
“We’re genuinely excited to bring something different and special to The Valley for a matchday, but equally so for the potential of what it can do for the club and community trust for non-matchday activity too. As a huge fan of the club, it’s an honour to have this opportunity and we hope it’ll show Charlton leading the way across clubs nationwide.”
David James, Director of Education & Sport at Charlton Athletic Community Trust, added: “The Cyberlabs Gaming Box is a fantastic use of the space and a development we’re excited to be involved in. Conversations are underway to look at how participants from CACT’s wide range of projects and programmes can access the recreational and educational opportunities that these state-of-the-art facilities provide.”
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