We have fielded a few enquiries as to why basketballs have been allowed on the playground, whereas footballs are not. The explanation is simply that the likelihood of injury to a passer-by from a thrown or bounced basketball is significantly less than from a kicked football. The ‘range’ is much smaller too. That is, of course, as long as the basketballs are properly used and aren’t kicked as a substitute football.
Sadly, we did have a major injury (a broken wrist) last week as the result of inappropriate use of a basketball. We would rather not jump straight into an outright ban, but give the children a reminder and a chance to use the basketballs properly. So… basketballs remain allowed, but any children using theirs to play football with will be stopped from bringing theirs in. If major problems arise, we will, sadly, have to resort to a wider ban.
There is no ban on football per se, but it is timetabled and we limit the balls to those provided by us to keep the number of games going on at any given time to a manageable amount.