Village bans cricket after ball hits man in car park

Times

5 hours ago

The thwack of leather on willow has been a fixture in the village of Danbury for centuries, but devotees in Essex now fear the sound of silence after a member of the public reported he was hit by a cricket ball while standing by his car at a leisure centre.
Three clubs have been banned from using Dawson Fields for matches after the alleged incident before a fixture on May 17.
The developments have spread panic among Danbury, Oaklands and Tuskers cricket clubs, which are unable to play home matches and face uncertain futures.
Almost 3,000 residents have signed a petition urging Danbury parish council to overturn its suspension of cricket. Rory Carlton, club secretary of Danbury Cricket Club, said the clubs faced the option of having to pay tens of thousands of pounds to install a protective net around the ground or relocate.
'I think the council acted from a good place initially, they are trying to act in the interest of their residents, but I think they're just scared of the legal impact were something to happen,' Carlton said.
'We've been playing in Danbury since 1798. Our team have been playing at that specific location for well over 50 years, and in that time probably well over a million balls have been bowled, if not more, and there has not been a single recorded incident of a member of the public actually being injured.
'The proposals on the table at the moment are either to ­essentially put up nets, which would be, as it stands, 20 metres high at a cost of around £100,000, which is just ­completely prohibitive for the council and us.
'The other option is to relocate; the costs for that are also of a similar ­magnitude, so it's kind of left us in a spot where they're saying, 'You know, we want to support cricket, but you just can't play here', which is really disappointing.'
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Danbury has managed to arrange to play their remaining home games for the season at Rayne Cricket Club, which is more than an hour away in Braintree, a journey which Carlton fears could lead to members leaving the team.
Carlton, 36, a financial adviser from Haybridge in Essex, believes the council's ruling could become a precedent that could leave grassroots clubs at risk of closure.
'I think if we start going down this road of, you know, members of the public have to be completely protected at all times, it becomes very difficult to actually engage in any kind of amateur sport, unless you've got a facility that is completely segregated from the general public who aren't participating,' Carlton said.
'There are countless cricket clubs, some really lovely grounds I've played at that are right next to a road or a pub.'
Danbury parish council was ­approached for comment.
A spokeswoman for the council previously said that it had hoped the suspension would be temporary and that the council had taken professional advice on how to minimise the risk to members of the public in areas ­surrounding the ground.
'The fact that there were at least two car windows, within the last year, smashed by cricket balls being hit into the adjacent car park, across a public footway, indicates that there is a risk to people accessing the ­facilities,' she told The Telegraph. 'As such, it would potentially invalidate its insurance cover and risk litigation if it were to totally ignore the advice that has been received.
'We are waiting for the ball trajectory report that the Essex Cricket Board have recommended to both the cricket clubs and the parish council in order to determine the correct ­mitigation.'