There has been a call for Belfast City Council to bring back into use "missing" football pitches due to a growing demand.
DUP East Belfast councillors have highlighted a number of playing fields and unused sites in the area that could be utilised to provide football facilities for many of the popular teams in the area.
Some of the locations were historically used as football pitches a number of years ago, such as in King George V Playing Fields, Victoria Park and at Danny Blanchflower stadium.
The King George V playing fields, which are located beside The Oval, once had two football pitches on them but in recent years the goalposts have been removed and the markings are no longer there. At Danny Blanchflower there are also two former pitches that are no longer in use.
Despite new changing rooms being installed at Victoria Park, the football pitches there are also in a poor condition and not used by local clubs.
There are also a number of sites in the Alderman Tommy Patton Memorial Park that could be utilised for pitches. A fenced off section of the park has a small running track and shot-put mound, although it is not known who installed them or put the fence up.
Speaking to Belfast Live, DUP councillors David Brooks and George Dorrian said they would be bringing a motion to the council calling for pitches to be brought back into use in order to meet the high demand in East Belfast and across the city.
Councillor Dorrian said: "At present there is a huge demand for football pitches across East Belfast with local clubs having a lot of difficulty in securing pitches for their teams to play on.
"This is while we are not utilising areas that have been historically used as football pitches such as King George V Playing Fields and Danny Blanchflower.
"There are locations that with a little bit of investment, could be valuable facilities for these teams and there seems to be no explanation as to why they are not being used.
"Clubs in East Belfast are crying out for pitches that can be used at an appropriate time for their youth teams and it would also be welcomed if investment was made in floodlighting for the pitches already in place, so that they can be used all year round by teams."
Councillor Brooks said: "George and I have been engaging with a range of local clubs and what is clear is there is a huge demand for pitch time, whether for training or for matchday use. I've engaged with clubs in Lisnasharragh like Clonduff, Cregagh Wanderers and Bloomfield, I joined George down to see the kids training here at East Belfast not long ago too.
"All have different priorities and ambitions we work to assist them with and we share the desire to drive facilities forward in this part of the city.
"We're not just talking senior teams, we're talking about hundreds of children, boys and girls, getting out meeting friends, getting some coaching in football, developing their social skills in an age where so many can be stuck to the playstation or iphones. Having fun, and getting a bit of exercise too. All work done by volunteers putting time and effort into our communities - why would we not want to maximise the space for that to take place.
"Some of the plans clubs have will take time, but in the short term we know there are these areas of land under council ownership that are under-utilised and with what is relatively small investment we could add to the pitch space and available to clubs across East Belfast.
"Of course any investment will benefit the Council too as these pitches are hired by clubs. We know from the recent committee where our motion was considered that there will be two reports coming back, and I plan to ask at Council whether in looking at improvements whether we could look at some level of lighting at some pitches to increase the hours of use in winter too - football being largely played over the winter months when the nights are shorter.
"All of this is looking at what we can do in the short term to help our local clubs, and the people who volunteer their time to keep them going, have greater access to the facilities they need."
