A wedding had to be cancelled after Travellers set up an unauthorised caravan encampment at the venue.
Over the Coronation weekend a three day break-in took place at Rhyl Rugby Club and staff and council workers had to spend a whole day picking up litter, dog faeces and human excrement after they left on Monday afternoon, reports North Wales Live.
The club were left to stump up a bill for “thousands” of pounds and a planned wedding reception with 140 guests had to be cancelled at the last minute just as the organisers were finishing decorating for the occasion.
Rugby matches had to be switched to different pitches elsewhere, and a party for adults with special needs was cancelled.
The Travellers allegdy ignored the 24 cameras ringing the fenced pitches at Tynewydd Fields to cut the gate locks and gain entry.
Club manager says that they then demanded £4,000 to move the 10 caravans and cars they parked up at the venue.
He claimed: “When they arrived they were very aggressive. I parked the club van in front of the gates so they could not get out and they told me they would turn it over.
“We had a duty to our staff, who felt intimidated, and to players, who were due to play the next day, so we made alternative arrangements. It’s just so wrong - the adults were abusive, horrible, and we were left with a big clean-up when they finally left.”
The wedding couple were just finishing preparations when the Travellers arrived at around 9.30pm on Friday night.
The pair were then forced to arrange an alternative venue nearby.
“The couple did not want their wedding here, which is understandable,” said Mr Blackmore.
“So they took down their decorations and moved to Meliden. We lent them table cloths as their new venue didn’t have enough.”
Denbighshire Council brought along portable toilets for the Travellers and then sent workers to help with the clear-up after they left.
Mr Blackmore said: “To stop the kids climbing over fences, we opened up our playground for them to use. But there were dogs running around all over the place and, when the Travellers finally left, the field was in a terrible mess, with dog and human faeces everywhere.
“This has cost us thousands. As well as the lost wedding booking, we’ve promised to pay all the staff who were locked out through no fault of their own. And with it being Coronation weekend, we were expecting a lot of people to come here to watch the event on TV, have lunch and visit the bar.”
As it was the weekend, Cllr Brian Jones, says the local authority could not act and called for new provisions to be made available to make enforcement possible at weekends and Bank Holidays.
North Wales Police officers attended over the weekend but Mr Blackmore said he was disappointed by the lack of intervention.
“I wasn’t impressed, to be honest. We’ve got very clear CCTV evidence of two men cutting the locks and I identified both of them to the police. But no action was taken.”
The club said it was grateful to Abergele RFC for stepping in to help, and for Denbighshire Council for overseeing the clean-up.
Mr Blackmore said the episode was 'heart-breaking.'
“Since moving to our town centre base in Rhyl in 2019, we’ve had to deal with the pandemic and now this,” he said. “Committee members, staff and volunteers have worked hard to build the club up to where it is – we now have 380 players in our junior set-up.
“This is as much a community club as it is a rugby club, so what happened over the weekend was heart-breaking. Having said that, I don’t want to tar all Travellers with the same brush - there is good and bad in all of us.”
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