Published: Friday, 25th April, 2008 09:00
Police in frame for pitch damage
By David Knox
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Tyre marks can clearly be seen on the churned-up pitch
GROUNDSMEN in Peebles have been driven round the bend by late-night neds – or so they thought.
On Friday night a vehicle was driven on Whitestone Park leaving ruts along the entire wing of the football pitch.
But instead of boy racers it is the local cops who are in the frame for the pitch invasion, which led to Saturday’s match being cancelled.
The finger of suspicion initially pointed at neds who often gather in the football stand to get drunk.
But it has emerged that the prime suspects are now Peebles police officers who were chasing a gang of youths late on Friday night.
A source told the Peeblesshire News: “Everyone was criticizing the boy racers but it was a police van that was on the pitch.
“There was a group down there and the police gave chase in the van – they shouldn’t have driven onto the grass as it was really soft.”
Football bosses spent all of Saturday morning attempting to repair the damage – but the East of Scotland First Division game with Gala Fairydean was called off when the referee inspected the pitch just minutes before the kick off.
They scattered half-a-ton of sand over the damaged areas and rolled it for almost an hour in vain.
As well as tyre marks along one end of the pitch there was also broken booze bottles scattered around the ground.
Manager Mark Lamb told the Peeblesshire News: “It is sickening and frustrating to find this kind of mess.
“There were vodka and lager bottles all over the place and the car made a real mess of the pitch. We don’t know who is responsible for the tyre marks but it has cost us quite a bit of money and time.”
We asked Lothian and Borders Police to respond to the allegations made against their officers, but they hadn’t been able to establish if a police vehicle was at Whitestone Park on Friday night by the time we went to press.
But a spokeswoman for G Division said: “It we are at fault we will put our hands up to it.”
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