Dispute over hundreds of wayward cricket balls tormenting residents is finally resolved
A decades-long dispute between a cricket club and neighbouring residents who have been bombarded by hundreds of stray balls has been hit for six after £20,000 was secured for giant nets.
Bill Jones, who lives next door to Wednesbury Cricket Club, has had so many cricket balls hit into his garden from wayward batsman he began donating them to a junior team in Wales.
The pensioner and his neighbours could not even risk their children and grandchildren playing in their gardens during matches in case they were injured.
Bill said: "I've had more than 300 cricket balls fly into my garden over the years, I've had windows smashed, roof tiles smashed, guttering broken and even my washing machine cracked.
"The fellow next door had a greenhouse for a while but he had to get rid of the thing in the end because it was getting destroyed.
"The funny thing is the club reckoned the balls were not from their players, so I decided to keep them because if I handed them back then it would be like giving them a license to do it again.
"I began donating the balls to whoever needed them including a children's team in Wales."
Cricket balls cost anything between £5 and £50 and over the 48 years Bill has lived in his house he's given away a pretty penny's worth of balls.
The 75-year-old said: "They could take your head off so we could not let our great-grandchild play when the club was playing, but now they have been given the money for these nets everything should be OK.
Luke Giles, who is standing for Labour in May's election in Wednesbury, was asked by Bill to find a way to stop the barrage of balls into the gardens of the residents of Vimy Terrace.
Luke said: "This argument goes back decades, all the way back to the days when Peter Archer was MP in the 1980s but nothing could be done.
"The cricket club is great for the community and I asked Sandwell Council's sports and leisure department for funding for nets and then for Wednesbury Town to match it, which they did and we ended up with £20,000.
"The funding for nets is great for the cricket club and for local residents who no longer have to worry about flying cricket balls when they are in the gardens."
Wednesbury Town lead Simon Hackett sanctioned the funds for the giant nets.
He said: "Wednesbury Cricket Club is a great community facility and long may that continue, this problem has been going for years with the neighbours and its nice to see a solution where everyone is a winner."
The Wood Green ground has been Wednesbury Cricket Club's home since 1875 and has successful adult and junior teams.
Club members said they "were delighted" with the funding for the new nets.
