The planned meeting on April 20 was revealed when councillors on Slough Borough Council's neighbourhoods and community services scrutiny panel met on Tuesday.

Worried councillors raised their concerns with the authority's head of wellbeing and community services Ketan Gandhi.

Mr Gandhi revealed that hirings had dropped from 28 to 14 over three years as teams looked for cheaper sites.

Rising charges have been controversial but there have been other problems.

A sorry picture emerged as councillors discussed the growing number of issues - including teams from outside that surreptitiously use the pitches without paying and bad organisation that has seen changing rooms left locked when players expected to make use of them.

Cllr James Swindlehurst (Labour: Cippenham Green) said: "We have turned something that worked into something that's broken. The whole thing is rather sad."

Mr Gandhi felt that part of the problem might be that the running of the pitches had tended to fall confusingly between three departments - parks, leisure and corporate landlord.

He was optimistic about the number of children's clubs still using the grounds but acknowledged that some adult clubs had been lost.

Councillors agreed unanimously to work to regain the initiative as soon as possible, by making their pitches welcoming again.

It was even hoped that woman's football could soon flourish in the town.