Playing Surface

Another factor that isn't helping is that we're playing games twice a week (not all at BP) so it's getting more use than in other seasons.

Even the training ground is a bit on the Cheapside

Quoted from Ruston AT

  I shall put my point with the fear of being multiple Red Crossed/ abused.

   I thought tuesday night the playing surface was deteriorating very quickly and yesterday it was not much better in fact worse. Our fantastic groundsman/person has won awards for having fantastic playing surfaces whats changed? There has been a lot of rain but surely there are ways to drain the pitch or is it all part of the "new ground scenario so we'll not bother with the pitch". We could end up playing on a bog of a pitch which could cost us more points.

  There i've said it.

I agree with the other comments, lots of rain recently but not helped by the pathetic decision by the club to furlough the groundsman who I assume isn't on a fantastic wage but by not having him look after the pitch during the lock down and summer months will have a detrimental effect on the pitch.

Quoted from Ruston AT

  I shall put my point with the fear of being multiple Red Crossed/ abused.

   I thought tuesday night the playing surface was deteriorating very quickly and yesterday it was not much better in fact worse. Our fantastic groundsman/person has won awards for having fantastic playing surfaces whats changed? There has been a lot of rain but surely there are ways to drain the pitch or is it all part of the "new ground scenario so we'll not bother with the pitch". We could end up playing on a bog of a pitch which could cost us more points.

  There i've said it.

Why should playing on a mud heap cost us more points? If we have decent players and it’s our home ground I can’t see why it is any disadvantage at all. Remember John Beck used to deliberately soak the Cambridge pitch when he was manager there.

Quoted from TheRonRaffertyFanClub

Why should playing on a mud heap cost us more points? If we have decent players and it’s our home ground I can’t see why it is any disadvantage at all. Remember John Beck used to deliberately soak the Cambridge pitch when he was manager there.

ahhhh yes, but he had a system...a masterplan.....

Seen some great games played in mud-bath conditions at Blundell Park. One that springs to mind is ironically against Cambridge, Easter 1972. Same for both sides so this is a poor excuse. I realise the pitch should be better in to 2020's but get on with it

For years we had one of the best pitches in the country so don't know why its gone down the pan in the last 5 years or so and is now one of the worst in the country.

Ill fill you in. As a member of the groundstaff when I worked there 20+ years ago, Mike Phillips had a strict regime every May after the last home game. I presume he still does.

Within days he would get a machine in which I believe was called a corer. It would be pulled behind a tractor, slowly, using mechanics it would punch holes into the playing surface and pull out a plug of soil. This could take a couple of days. The cores would then have to be removed from the surface, usually with a snow shovel by a team of lackies, of which I was one, alongside Nobby! This could take a day with 6 people doing it. Very heavy work. Several tonnes of soil would have to be removed. Leaving the pitch to 'breathe' with all the newly opened holes, this aided drainage from the previously compacted surface. Normally about a week later, there would be a delivery of many, many tonnes of sand, which had to be barrowed onto the pitch, dumped in equidistant piles all across the whole playing surface, and then all the sand had to be swept, using a brush, to fill all of the holes to the top. Very laborious and time consuming. From start to finish it could take over 3 weeks to complete.

Because Mike Phillips was furloughed, and Johnny Useless was going in and ONLY cutting the grass, none of the above got done during the out of season, so thats why the pitch is getting chewed up every single match. There was no tender loving, award winning TLC on the pitch, which means that the playing surface now has 18 months of compacted soil one it, not allowing surface water to drain away as easily. Daily rain for a week could easily turn the once upon a time award winning pitch into a quagmire, and also if there is plenty of water lying below the surface, where there is a naturally high water table, the pitch could quite easily freeze up, something which rarely happened in the past while MP has been in charge.

In a normal season, if Town was playing away from home two or three times on the trot, the Groundstaff would have time to aerate the pitch and do everything they could to make the pitch as good as it could be. Mike deserved all the accolades he received for his care of the pitch and it was a pleasure working with him.

Hope this helps and explains the workings of the playing surface, and the reason it is how it is now.

It's as if the current regime has operated a scorched (compact) earth policy.

Quoted from WayneBurnettsJockstrap

Ill fill you in. As a member of the groundstaff when I worked there 20+ years ago, Mike Phillips had a strict regime every May after the last home game. I presume he still does.

Within days he would get a machine in which I believe was called a corer. It would be pulled behind a tractor, slowly, using mechanics it would punch holes into the playing surface and pull out a plug of soil. This could take a couple of days. The cores would then have to be removed from the surface, usually with a snow shovel by a team of lackies, of which I was one, alongside Nobby! This could take a day with 6 people doing it. Very heavy work. Several tonnes of soil would have to be removed. Leaving the pitch to 'breathe' with all the newly opened holes, this aided drainage from the previously compacted surface. Normally about a week later, there would be a delivery of many, many tonnes of sand, which had to be barrowed onto the pitch, dumped in equidistant piles all across the whole playing surface, and then all the sand had to be swept, using a brush, to fill all of the holes to the top. Very laborious and time consuming. From start to finish it could take over 3 weeks to complete.

Because Mike Phillips was furloughed, and Johnny Useless was going in and ONLY cutting the grass, none of the above got done during the out of season, so thats why the pitch is getting chewed up every single match. There was no tender loving, award winning TLC on the pitch, which means that the playing surface now has 18 months of compacted soil one it, not allowing surface water to drain away as easily. Daily rain for a week could easily turn the once upon a time award winning pitch into a quagmire, and also if there is plenty of water lying below the surface, where there is a naturally high water table, the pitch could quite easily freeze up, something which rarely happened in the past while MP has been in charge.

In a normal season, if Town was playing away from home two or three times on the trot, the Groundstaff would have time to aerate the pitch and do everything they could to make the pitch as good as it could be. Mike deserved all the accolades he received for his care of the pitch and it was a pleasure working with him.

Hope this helps and explains the workings of the playing surface, and the reason it is how it is now.

That’s really informative, thank you. Another example of where the club didn’t think this season would ever start.