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Pitches

Red Wimp

Red Wimp

Vital Football Legend
I don’t know if it’s because I’m seeing more games this season but seems lot of pitches in poor condition in our league. Peterborough’s is unbelievable, I would have thought it would hamper them but they have the best home record so obviously not.
Glancing through MOTD can see the difference to Premier League, like night and day.
Is under soil heating a requirement in the Championship?
 
Red Wimp said:
I don’t know if it’s because I’m seeing more games this season but seems lot of pitches in poor condition in our league. Peterborough’s is unbelievable, I would have thought it would hamper them but they have the best home record so obviously not.
Glancing through MOTD can see the difference to Premier League, like night and day.
Is under soil heating a requirement in the Championship?
Click to expand...

I think a lot of the pitch remedial works and re-seeding etc wasn’t always done pre season because of the pandemic. Lots of clubs had skeleton staff working so I think that was an area to suffer in clubs plans. Let’s be honest, keeping pitches pristine costs a lot of money, and most clubs haven’t been flush with money for around a year now.
 
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Red Wimp said:
I don’t know if it’s because I’m seeing more games this season but seems lot of pitches in poor condition in our league. Peterborough’s is unbelievable, I would have thought it would hamper them but they have the best home record so obviously not.
Glancing through MOTD can see the difference to Premier League, like night and day.
Is under soil heating a requirement in the Championship?
Click to expand...
Peterborough had a problem because the watering system failed under the pitch causing major damage.
 
I think you actually notice it more when you have the high camera angle. Even when Sincil Bank was a sand pit in the Keith early days it didn't seem as bad when you were actually there. Couple that with the furlough scheme because of the pandemic and the pitches have struggled
 
Red Wimp said:
I don’t know if it’s because I’m seeing more games this season but seems lot of pitches in poor condition in our league. Peterborough’s is unbelievable, I would have thought it would hamper them but they have the best home record so obviously not.
Glancing through MOTD can see the difference to Premier League, like night and day.
Is under soil heating a requirement in the Championship?
Click to expand...

I would suspect that it is more to do with drainage underneath the grass than heating. The top pitches aren't just about the turf itself. They are a complete metre deep system:
hybrid-grass-pitch-infographic.jpg


Premier League teams use hybrid turfs (grass and astro) and can afford a lot more care on the pitch as a whole.

The hybrid element means that even if the grass suffers, you still see a nice green pitch and it is much more hardy.

If I remember rightly every PL team is now using hybrid turf.

https://eandt.theiet.org/content/ar...ball-pitches-why-the-grass-is-always-greener/
 
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A hybrid pitch is mandatory in the Premiership as is under soil heating. The amount of water they can take through is fantastic.

It's been a big talking point about the state of pitches with many clubs not doing any renovations due to the uncertainty. There was an awful lot of groundsmen on furlough too. This really seems to highlight the importance of end of season works. It's also clear that grass does not look after itself either.
I know this isn't football but Twickenham was ripped up and reseeded just over a month ago. To grow in a pitch in midwinter is an unbelievable feat and they have managed it. They had been trying to nurse the pitch through lockdown on minimal inputs and it wasn't thought good enough.
 
They probably all have something similar now but Arsenal were one of the first in the PL to have a system where they could set the soil moisture at a certain percentage, draw the moisture out if needed and store it for use at a later date.
 
mishimp said:
A hybrid pitch is mandatory in the Premiership as is under soil heating. The amount of water they can take through is fantastic.
Click to expand...

Presume you get some grace, and especially with the short pre-season in 2020.
Read that the Leeds pitch they started with was laid new for Euro 1996! Spurs did them a deal recently with some surplus turf as they'd not hosted NFL games at their ground last Autumn.
 
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