Devastated members of Shenfield Cricket Club are "absolutely gutted" this week after vandals poured up to 25 litres of motor oil over their pitch.

And with the start of the new season just weeks away, club chairman Steve Moseley admits he doesn't yet know if it can be restored to a reasonable condition in time -- and says the Essex Premiership side may be forced to play all its games away from home.

He said: "We are gutted, absolutely gutted. They've completely ruined half the square and the groundsman thinks we might not be able to use it for the entire season.

We've tried all sorts of stuff to get it off but it's looking like we might have to dig it up and start again.

"I don't know what we are going to do. It takes years and years of hard work to get a cricket square ready to play the level of cricket that we play.

"If we have to dig it up, we are probably talking about a couple of seasons before we can use it again. If we can't get it right for the first game we will speak to the league and probably have to play all of our premiership games away from home this season.

"We have got more than 80 colts and don't know where they are going to play either. It breaks my heart."

An empty 25 litre oil container was found at the club's ground in Chelmsford Road, Shenfield, but Mr Moseley says he cannot think of any motive for the vandalism.

"I really don't know what makes someone do something mindless like that. We have had to go to extreme lengths and buy some movement-sensitive security lights to make sure it doesn't happen again."

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.