A split has divided two of Brechin’s leading sporting bodies and left the town’s junior rugby club homeless.
Brechin Junior Rugby Club has moved from its permanent base of Guthrie Park after its eight-year relationship with Brechin Buccaneers Cricket Club turned sour.
The row is threatening to take the shine off the anniversary celebrations currently being held to mark the 200th year of cricket in Brechin.
Colin Tinsley, senior committee member of BJRFC, issued a statement on behalf of the committee to quash what he described as “inaccurate rumours” and he said the split was a “sad affair”.
The statement read: “The past few months have witnessed a series of incidents that have resulted in a rift between the rugger enthusiasts and the cricketers, destroying a symbiotic relationship of eight years’ standing.
“The two city clubs had worked in seasonal unison for the best part of a decade, with Brechin Junior Rugby Football Club (BJRFC) playing a pivotal role in the ground’s maintenance and finance during the months that it lay dormant, making use of a facility that was donated by the Guthrie family to the common good of the city.
“In the early years the relationship between the two sports clubs was widely hailed a great success primarily by the now Brechin Buccaneers Cricket Club (BBCC) and lauded as a means to elicit greatest use of the ground to the betterment of the community.
“It is understood that a change in the committee of the BBCC has resulted in their unilaterally scrapping an agreement with BJRFC, a union that has seen the children’s rugby players greatly boost cricket club’s coffers at a time when its finances were in disarray.
“This change in policy that has effectively ousted the rugby players has been brought about primarily by this change of heart and the way in which BJRFC was to be charged for use of facilities at Guthrie Park.”
The statement said the situation took a turn for the worse in January “with the cricketers issuing the rugby club an ‘eviction notice’ citing inability to reach agreement and ‘obvious irreconcilable differences’ ”.
Brechin Buccaneers declined the opportunity to respond to the statement.