Travellers moving onto a football playing field have forced a club to cancel its training sessions.

The caravans pitched up on the Festival Playing Field in New Road, Sheerness, on Monday after previously being parked on the Scrapsgate Playing Field in Minster, both on the Isle of Sheppey.

New Road FC, the local football club which trains on the field, was forced to cancel all sessions this week after finding out yesterday that the travellers had set up on the field.

The club's vice chairman Ashley Temple said: "Our committee decided to cancel all training this week due to the incident. It couldn't have happened at a worse time.

"We had only just paid for maintenance of the pitches in June to make sure they are all ready for when the Medway District Youth League starts on Sunday, September 11.

"We've had to cancel our new girls' training sessions that have only just started too. This week there will be more than 150 boys and girls aged between three and 16-years-old not playing the sport they love.

"We are hoping once we get an update from the council it will be good news and we will be able to resume as soon as possible."

A Swale Borough Council spokesman said: “We visited the unauthorised encampment at Festival Field in Sheerness yesterday to carry out our initial assessments and are now in the process of getting a date and time for them to leave.”

The group of travellers were given until the afternoon of Friday August 26 to leave the Scrapsgate Road site after pitching there the previous Sunday, with a council spokesman saying last week: "We visited the unauthorised encampment at Scrapsgate Field in Minster today to inform them that they have until Friday afternoon to move on.

"With the bank holiday weekend coming up, it’s important that local people have use of the public space.”

However, the caravans stayed on the field for three days after their deadline, with one resident, who asked not to be named, expressing concern that they "were able to benefit from the use of the park, unlike the locals" over the bank holiday weekend.

The group of travellers then moved onto the Sheerness field used by New Road Football Club, reportedly leaving the Scrapsgate Road site in a state.

Another resident, who also wished to remain anonymous, said of the travellers in Scrapsgate Playing Field: "They dumped a pile of tree cuttings at the rear of the playing field and consistently used the footpaths as a toilet.

"This park was very popular with families and dog walkers, but now they are having to avoid it because it is so disgustingly dirty."

The same travellers are believed to have camped on private land at the entrance to Blue Town over the summer nest to Naval Terrace.

Before that, they were on land on the Lower Road at its junction with Barton's Hill Drive, Minster.

This comes after a man in Upnor, who rents a field for boot sales that was previously disrupted by travellers, has invested in extreme measures to prevent them from returning.

After hearing about caravans moving onto a park in Gillingham, Mark Greenfield installed four anti-tank defences, locked the gates with two chains and hired a security guard.

Another group of travellers which had previously pitched up in Northfleet moved onto a children's park in St Gregory's Crescent, Gravesend last week.

As of Tuesday morning they were still on the site.