Some soccer players aren’t getting a kick out of changes to their practice time after a few residents complained about balls going into their yards in Winsloe.
Wally Morrison is a coach with the Winsloe Charlottetown Royals Soccer Club and said a few weeks ago some of the players were told they couldn’t use the whole field to practice.
“We were quite shocked because for one thing we only have two fields that we can work on,” he said.
The soccer club plays and practices on fields on Lower Malpeque Road where houses have replaced neighbouring farm land and backyards border two soccer fields.
Morrison said there is a net that protects the backyards near one of the fields, but occasionally balls will make it onto the neighbouring properties.
“It’s very rare,” he said.
But because the fields were there before the house, any homeowners who moved in next to the fields would have known they were there, Morrison said.
“You purchased a home and moved in here, do you figure that there’s not going to be anything in connection with the soccer fields in the summer time?”
Morrison said the majority of the residents seem to be fine with the fields and will even throw the balls back if they are in their backyards when an errant ball lands on their property.
He also said that whenever balls do go into people’s yards, the players go get them and run back onto the field right away.
“They’re not being intrusive.”
For players who are older than the under-16 age group, they have to practice on the end of the fields away from the houses, Morrison said.
“If it had been an issue of foul language or anything like that, man I would have been one of the first ones to jump forward and say ‘look that’s gotta stop because people live here,’” he said.
Morrison said he also hasn’t heard of any issues related to soccer balls breaking things in people’s yards.
“This is a new thing for this year.”
Charlottetown’s parks and recreation manager Sue Hendricken said the city isn’t forcing the club to change anything, but is asking the older players to use the part of the fields away from houses when practicing shots on goal.
“It’s certainly not an issue of people not being able to access the fields,” she said.
Hendricken said this is the first summer any of the residents have complained to the city and there have only been a few complaints so far.
“This is the first time that we’ve run into it,” she said.
Although there is netting along parts of the fields, the city isn’t planning to add more and is hoping to resolve the issue through the way people practice or play on the fields, she said.
“It’s hugely expensive to install this netting.”
