Gosberton Riesgate villagers complain about junior football on its playing field

The chairman of a junior football club fears that people in Gosberton Risegate are trying to stop youngsters playing matches in the village.

George Wallis, of Pinchbeck United Junior Football Club, is to hold talks with Gosberton Parish Council members next month about the use Gosberton Risegate's playing fields, off Siltside.

During a virtual meeting on Monday, parish councillors were told of complaints about the number of parked cars on Siltside when junior football matches are played on Saturday mornings.

It was also claimed that an agreement not to have more than one match played at the same time by two of the club's under-eight boys' and an under-11 girl's had been broken since the new season started in September.

Mr Wallis said: "We contacted the parish council last October as we needed somewhere to play our matches on a Saturday morning between 9am and noon.

"The council offered us Gosberton Risegate's playing field, on the understanding that we'd cut and maintain the grass.

"We've been using the playing field since September and we're trying our best to work with the local residents.

"But they don't want us there and any excuse they can find to put a complaint in, they'll use it.

"Out of the four or five weeks that we've used the playing field, we've only had problems on two of them when the girls ended up playing at the same time as the boy

"So we've rectified that by moving the girls' team somewhere else and we do what we can to fit the cars in the parking space we've got down there."

Speaking at Monday's meeting, Coun Sue Thorley said: "After having received complaints from residents, I spoke to the coaches and said that they must ensure matches aren't run back to back.

"The residents don't like the amount of cars that are parked on Siltside and so I went down to the playing field on three Saturday mornings.

"On the first week when the girls played, there were 21 cars and the next week when the under-eights played there were 27 cards.

"But on the third week, there were over 40 cars and the residents aren't happy."

. Call for better planning of remembrance events

An idea to have a “planning team” for future Remembrance Sunday services in the Gosberton area is to be put forward by parish councillors.

Concerns over a lack of communication this year’s services, one in Gosberton at 11am followed by one in Gosberton Risegate at 3pm, were raised during Monday’s meeting.

Coun John Clark, parish council chairman, said: “We need to have some sort of remembrance committee because none of us knew what was going.

“It was a bit awkward going out to Gosberton in the morning, going home and then going out again in the afternoon.

“There isn’t a Royal British Legion branch in Gosberton any more so we need a planning time of two or three people who know how remembrance events are going to be run.”