End of the line for Eversheds' private client practice

Eversheds has shed the last of its private client-related teams after partner Neil Sparrow and his five-lawyer Norwich team agreed to join East Anglian firm Birketts.

Eversheds decided to close its private client function in London last April and transferred the practice to Dawsons. The Norwich-based agriculture and estate planning team are the last to go and will join Birketts in May.

Eversheds' senior partner for the East of England Terry Gould said: "As we implement our strategic plan to drive the firm forward, we've decided to focus the Norwich office on its core practices, including the unmatched corporate, real estate and HR teams we have in the region. The agriculture team focuses more on agricultural property, estate planning and related private client work and therefore does not fit into the firm's current business model."

Birketts now has 85 lawyers split between its offices in Norwich and Ipswich. The Eversheds team will boost the firm's turnover, which stood at £7m, according to The Lawyer Rising 50.