Unless I'm having a blind moment I cannot see where one would set the groups permissions re Clubs - could someone post a screenshot please ?

There are no permissions. Everything is handled through the club type.

There are a few membergroup permissions, e.g. if an what club types a membergroup can create. 

33 minutes ago, opentype said:

There are a few membergroup permissions, e.g. if an what club types a membergroup can create. 

Ah - where are these set ?

ACP → Members → Groups → [Group Name] → Social → Clubs

Thanks, seems I have a plugin conflict as the option was not there until I disabled all other plugins .. Once that was done I was able to set it up.