Vandals cause £1000 of pitch damage: Members of Old Laurentian RFC and Old Laurentians Minis & Juniors have been left saddened after finding £1,000 of damage to their pitches.

On the night of Wednesday, October 9 – October 10, vandals caused around £1,000 of damage to two out of the three pitches on the site, off Lime Tree Avenue.

The damage means that the hundreds of under 7s and under 12s players were facing not being able to play this weekend.

But Market Bosworth RFC kindly offered the use of their facilities this weekend – and until the pitches can be brought back up to standard.

Kevin Vince, chairman of the Minis and Juniors branch of the club, told the Advertiser: “Volunteers put a lot of time and effort over the summer to get these pitches to the point they are possibly the best in the county.

“And then some little scumbags come onto the pitch and cause £1,000 worth of damage in one night – we’ve been set back by months.

“I would be saying to them, ‘if you’re big enough and brave enough to cause this damage, why don’t you come up and explain to hundreds of children why they can’t play rugby on their pitches this weekend? But they won’t, because they’re cowards’.

“For a lot of the children, this is the highlight of their week.

“This mindless act of vandalism has achieved nothing. For a quick fix of laughs they have disappointed hundreds of kids.

Mr Vince praised the rugby-playing community and the residents of the town for their kind responses.

He said: “The rugby-playing community has come together with loads of people offering to help in whatever way they can, and the local community is helping out and checking CCTV.

Mr Vince said the club’s hundreds of members are all intent on catching the vandals so the police can deal with them.

He said: “Our club, when you include the families, is over 800 strong. We’re all listening and eventually one of us will hear something.

“Everyone is disgusted with this act of mindless vandalism, but we’re going to come back even stronger as a club.”

Andrew Spriggs, chairman of Old Laurentian RFC, said: “Since the incident our volunteers have been working hard to undo the damage.

“One contractor dropped everything they were doing and drove up from the Cotswolds to help.

“It’s disappointing – we try to be open to the community and encourage our neighbours on Lime Tree Avenue to come and use the grounds walk their dogs.

“We don’t want to close the grounds off to sensible people, but we are looking at having security posts and CCTV installed to deter anything like this from happening again.

“The response from the community has been marvelous.

“We’re hoping the pitches can be repaired next week.”

Mr Spriggs said there has already been some CCTV unearthed which could help with the investigation.

“We’re all going to do everything we can to see that these people are caught and brought to justice,” he added.

A spokesperson for the club took to Facebook, stating: “We have a team of volunteers who work tirelessly to keep our wonderful pitches in top condition and the impact of this will affect every single one of our players.”

Anyone with information is asked to call Warwickshire Police on 101, quoting crime ref 23/42725/19.

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