A grandmother believes she is lucky to be alive after being hit on the head with a cricket ball.

Elaine Daniels had been celebrating her granddaughter's birthday at Radnor Park in Folkestone when she was struck by a shot from a game being played nearby.

The 66-year-old, who works as a teaching assistant at St Eanswythe's Primary School in the town, underwent scans at the William Harvey Hospital in Ashford to check she had not suffered a bleed on the brain as a result of the freak accident.

Now Ms Daniels, of St Johns Church Road, is urging Folkestone and Hythe District Council (FHDC) to put up signs warning against the use of hard balls in the park.

Recalling the incident on July 29, she said: "I went to walk back to my car and suddenly I was hit 100 miles an hour by a cricket ball, I don't how I didn't get knocked out. I did see stars and it went all black.

"I did find the culprits who did it, because I was so shocked and angry. I've never ever been so hurt in my life.

"I had a little choice word with them, there was 14 of them playing cricket, adults as well, with a hard ball. And I'm thinking it's not right.

"I could have been killed.

"'I still haven't got my vision and still seeing like fireworks in my right eye, you know, colours and little floaters.

"And people say to me, 'I don't know how you're standing. I don't know how you weren't killed by the force of it'."

Since the accident she has contacted the council by phone and email to ask for signs to be put up, but she says she has received no reply.

"Had it been a child they had hit it would have killed them, killed them outright," she said.

"My view is that along the Leas they've got signs saying 'no skateboarding, no cycling', so they could at least - and I asked very nicely - put some sort of sign up saying no hard balls before someone gets killed."

The byelaws applying to parks and pleasure grounds in the district do not explicitly refer to particular games.

Instead they just say no one shall play a game "so as to give reasonable grounds for annoyance to any other person".

A spokesman for FHDC said: "Rules and byelaws relating to games do apply in Radnor Park and other designated sites.

"Incidents like this are extremely rare, but we will consider putting additional information about the restrictions on noticeboards in the park."