AIBU to ask neighbours not to hit cricket balls at our fence?

[Ohhelppp]

Moved in 6 months ago. We have a long boundary with several houses along one side. They have small gardens. When we moved in we noticed one part of the fence closest to our house has some holes in it and the trellis was broken. DH fixed the trellis but the holes aren’t too intrusive (low down/partly hidden by climbing plants) so we’ve left them.
We now realise that the family who own the garden are prolific cricketers and have heard them smashing balls into the fence. There are kids that play and DH has also heard an adult playing with them say “I’m going to hit it over the house” and proceeded to smack the ball into their neighbours house in an attempt to get it over their own roof.
We’ve had a few balls (not cricket!) come over into our garden and we thrown them back. I once had a brief chat with them through the hole in the fence the first time and they seemed nice enough. One of the boys also knocked on our door to ask for a ball back.
However, are we within our rights now to politely ask them not to smash balls into our fence? As I said, we have a long boundary and theirs is the only area where the fence is broken so it must be due to them smashing balls into it.
There is an actual cricket field with nets a 5 min walk away so not as if there is nowhere else for them to go!
Never had this issue before so no idea how to broach it.

Of course you're not unreasonable but they don't sound like the kind of people who care about reasonableness, so I wouldn't expect it to stop.

You can ask but the fact they are doing this anyway and think it’s ok just shows how selfish they are. If my kids wanted to play cricket in our garden like that I’d make sure there was some sort of net or something to stop the fence taking the brunt!

Good point! I didn’t know if there was something about enjoying your own garden space that they might be able to come back with.

Gosh they sound obtuse, self involved. Half wits! No idea if it’s possible to get through to people inclined that way. Very tricky.

It just makes me laugh. We speak to our kids if they’re yelling at
each other from the other end of the garden or generally being too loud and remind them to be respectful. We only had 2 neighbours in our old house and now we have many more so it’s a whole new world!

That’s really poor form from your neighbours. We are also a cricketing family and will use the garden for bowling practice. But we have installed a net in front of our back fence (which we own) to minimise noise. My dc are very careful not to hit towards our neighbour’s fence as it does not belong to us. We also planted a lot of shrubbery along our fences to act as natural barriers.

Your neighbours need telling.

Not if it is damaging your property.

They are entitled to enjoy their own garden space so long as they do not damage property belonging to others. Does the fence belong to you as marked on your deeds? If so you could respond that if this damage to your porperty continues you will have to take the matter further. However you would prefer not to do that and it would be better for them to make some arrangement. Such as putting up one of those nets to catch balls.

In the meantime I would not be so quick to throw back any balls which come over. Just do it once a week. Or do what my nephew does and throw them out into the street where any kids can pick them up as you "did not know" who they belonged to. You can also insist that you wil only return balls to a parent on a once weekly basis. If the parents are constantly having to retrieve or buy balls then they will soon get tued of it.

And they all call me a misery for not liking the summer. Hurry up dark nights and the entitled idiots can all piss off inside

I wouldn't be returning cricket balls - no one should be playing with those in a small back garden, close to other people's windows etc.
I can be pretty combative but I'd be telling them it stops or they are getting taken to the small claims court for the cost of replacing the fence.

Is it your fence or their fence?

We had this years ago and I asked them to stop playing with a hard cricket ball or that they would have to pay for a replacement fence. It stopped thank goodness and they played with a sponge ball or went up the local park.

Ours.

Next doors kids who send footballs and soft balls over, they get those back. Our previous neighbours (all adults) who used to belt cricket balls into all the neighbours' gardens, all the cricket balls went straight into the bin. Luckily they moved away before they smashed a window or knocked one of us out....