Pitch damaged weeks before £500k revamp launch

Members of a community football club have been left heartbroken after their newly-revamped pitch was vandalised just weeks before it was due to host its first match.

Llangynwyd Rangers FC in Bridgend county had spent half a million pounds in the past two months to improve its pavilion and grounds.

But on Friday morning, the club’s groundsman arrived at the site to prepare their other pitch for the weekend’s matches and discovered deep track marks running across it.

“It’s disgusting,” said club secretary Louise Vincent.

The club has more than 500 players ranging from under 6s, through to youth level and senior.

“It looks like a motorbike, it doesn’t look like children on their bikes.

“It’s known as our football pitch… we’ve asked people to keep off the grass while it was re-seeded and the local community have been amazing in general.

“There are so many mountains and cycle tracks around here, and yet someone has gone and done that.”

Ms Vincent said the club’s second pitch had “not been touched”, meaning no imminent matches would need to be cancelled, but added the launch of the club’s improvement works, due to happen next month, would now likely have to be postponed.

It comes after "months of hard work and investment" which saw the pitch closed off last season.

She added CCTV footage showed the pavilion, but had so far failed to help them identify who could have caused the damage.

“It’s heart-breaking,” she said.

“We have 530 players in our club who aren’t going to be able to use that pitch until we can get it sorted.

“With the weather as it is, it’s been so unpredictable, so we had just moved our training so it was all ready for a nice launch in October.”

The club’s renovation project included taking on ownership of its pavilion, redoing the changing facilities and upgrading the pitches, and had been supported by funding from the Football Association of Wales and the Cymru Football Foundation.