Artificial Surfaces
If you play game after game after game on a grass pitch it will start to get cut up, no matter what the weather conditions”
game after game after game on a grass pitch it will start to get cut up, no matter what the weather conditions.” The Gosforth 1st XV are currently occupying a mid-table position, but some opponents insist they have an unfair home advantage, something Graham takes issue with. “Visiting teams say we have an advantage because we play here week in week out but, for me, the only advantage is that we can play on the pitch 365 days of the year, and we can play on it when every other pitch in the county is waterlogged.” “The only thing that stops us playing on it is really heavy snow and, even then, it would take six inches of the stuff to stop us playing. It is much easier to clear and, once you start running on it the system drags away the moisture. The
more you run on it, the better it gets.” “We played one game last season when
the road outside was totally flooded, along with half the car park, but we still managed to play a game of rugby - it was the only game in the north that beat the elements.”
Not even last winter’s heavy snowfall, which brought much of the region to a halt, could stop the England student’s side from taking on their Irish counterparts in a rugby league international. “There is a saying in the north-east that it ‘bleaches down with snow’ and, on the night the English students rugby league team took on their Scottish counterparts, the snow was absolutely horrendous. We went around constantly cleaning the touchline, and jumping on
the halfway line and the 22, when there was a break in play. As the players disturbed the snow, it melted away. It was not perfectly clear, but the lads loved it.” As for the ‘burning’ issue of safety, Graham is quick to play down suggestions that it is hazardous. “The only thing against it, that I can think of, is that you do get burns every now and again. Surely though, it is better to land on that than on a hard surface. There is always a bit of bounce and spring in the surface, and it is nowhere near as bad as landing on the mud in September or October time, or at the back-end of the season when the pitches have dried out. It is clean and tidy and nice and flat so, when you are running, there are no divots to jar your leg into.” As the club prepare for their fixture
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