MACHINERY worth more than £16,000 has been in a raid on the Street End Cricket Club at Lower Hardres on Friday night.

Among equipment taken from a metal container beside the pavilion was a Ransomes hydraulic gang mower, a red Countax ride-on mower and Atco 16-blade, 32-inch cut mower and an industrial strimer.

Club chairman Alan Bensted said the thieves “sliced through the locks like butter” to get at the machinery.

But despite the loss work on the ground would not stop and cricket would continue.

“We will not be dismayed,” he said. “I have already made alternative arrangements to borrow the equipment we need to maintain the ground.”