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influence, as I am keen to support the club. It is a fantastic outfit, and one I will help in any way I can.'

The club has more than 200 juniors registered who play and train each week, and 80 regular players, aged over 16.

The youth teams had used land in Brightley owned by a member of the club as a place to train for around three years.

In November 2011, West Devon Borough Council ordered the club to stop using the site because of the affects the training and floodlights have on the area's ecology, and because it disrupted the character of the quiet and undeveloped rural location.

The club is currently planning to re-submit planning permission for the site, hoping to secure a training facility there for a two-year period. They would then use that time to secure a more appropriate long-term alternative.

At the meeting, club representatives and town councillors discussed the urgent search for land, highlighting plots in and around the town as potential sites for new sports pitches.

John Shields, chairman of the club's pitches sub-committee, said: 'This is the biggest issue the club has faced in a long time.

'The small field at Brightley has never been the long-term answer for us. But if we train on the two pitches we do have, we'd have no grass left.

'The youth teams now train on the all-weather pitches, at the Manor House Hotel sports hall and on the college pitches.

'There is limited availability for the all-weather pitches, and we only have limited use of the college pitches. They are rightly protective of their fields, and they also don't have floodlights. We do need at least two more pitches, ideally floodlit.'

Mr Shields said other clubs would have similar problems in the future: 'The hockey and football clubs anticipate they will face the same problems with the growth of the town and new developments.

'The proposed growth in population to the east of Okehampton is to be 2,000 people. Based on current membership levels, player numbers are expected to increase by up to 100 members in the next ten years.

'If we don't get our voices heard now, it could fall to the bottom of the agenda. We need sport pitches here, and we need them now.'

The borough council is currently carrying out a survey of the sports clubs in Okehampton and the surrounding area, to find out their requirements and development needs. The findings will then be fed into the infrastructure delivery plan for the town.