VANDALS have had a smashing time at a paintball venue – after running riot under the cover of darkness.

Combat Splat, at Ashton Keynes, is today counting the cost of damage wreaked by yobs in a late night raid.

It is suspected that a number of people scrambled over security gates to get into the eight- acre venue and then walked half a mile to get to the paintballing site.

Once there they upended picnic tables, smashed up wooden buildings and badly damaged other parts of the site.

Metal sheeting was also ripped off parts of buildings on the site.

Owner Steve Gleed says he cannot imagine Combat Splat, a place often used by charities and youth groups, having any enemies in the community.

And although he admits it was likely just done for the some kind of fun – he said he could not see why anyone would ever do such a senseless thing to a place used for fun.

The 21-year-old said: “At the moment we are spending all day just trying to get it ready for Thursday.

“If we can’t, there will be no paintball.

“That would mean the combined damage and loss of business could run to £1,000.

“It is annoying because it is such a mindless act, and it is substantial.

“We are not on bad terms with anyone.

“I took over the company last September and since then we have all been working hard and spending all of our budget on promotion of paintball.

“This is a real setback for us. The only thing I can think of is they thought something of value was here, but all our equipment is held off site.

“We have a great relationship with the community too.

“When I discovered this on Monday morning I just felt angry, it’s so senseless.”

The company has been in business since 2003 and has been broken into once before, however, on that occasion equipment was stolen instead of vandalism.

Because the site is so remote the police say they are are not investigating the vandalism further.

Steve said: “It is a bit surprising they can’t take anything any further but to be fair it is quite remote and they haven’t got much to go on.”