What do you want from us?

"This is a group of kids that you just sent back on the street," said Clr Sharon Wilson (LD - Poulton North).

She had received a letter from the group in which they argued that they cannot win.

"For the past couple of months, youths such as ourselves have been slated by both the Government and the press because of our so called anti-social behaviour. It seems to us we cannot win no matter what we do," it read.

"We walk around the streets and get told to move by the police or someone in the community, then we go for a harmless game of football and we get told to move.

"What do you want from us?"

At Monday night's meeting of Poulton and Fearnhead Parish Council, Alan O'Hanlon, parish clerk, said he moved the group on because bad weather had made the pitches unplayable.

The parish council leases the pitches to paying teams.

"If the decision is taken that it is unplayable, nobody plays on it," he explained.

"We have always had a problem with unofficial use," added Clr Colin Froggatt (Lab - Poulton South).

"It is not a ground which gives carte blanche use to anybody who wants to use it whenever they want and it has to have an element of control," he said.

But his comment sparked a debate on under age drinking at the ground, with Clr Sharon Wilson asking why, if the parish council controls the ground, it did nothing to stop drinking there at weekends.

Clr Froggatt said he had met with a crime reduction advisor to see what could be done on Bennetts Rec to minimise crime.

"This has been going on for seven years. Why are you only suddenly doing something now?" asked Clr Wilson, calling it a knee jerk reaction'.

Chairman, Clr Brian Maher (Lab - Poplars and Hulme) stopped the debate pending a report from the crime reduction advisor.

The parish council agreed to offer to help the group of teens set up a football team so they can book out Bennetts Rec and agreed to offer to fund a football strip for them, and put clearer signs at the ground to explain when pitches are unplayable.