Artificial Surfaces
Carpet being laid over the rubber shockpad
“We’re all pulling in the same direction with what we want to achieve on the pitch and in the community”
my whole career working in stadiums, so I know how they tick, but synthetic pitches are new to me; it’s been a steep learning curve.”
Born in north London in 1981, Holding
has already enjoyed a considerable career, spending some seventeen years at Spurs, working his way up the ranks from a fourteen year old doing work experience, to a Saturday boy, then completing an electrical apprenticeship before rising to the position of stadium manager. The move to rugby was a big step for
Danny, and he acknowledges that the club “took a gamble” on someone that was new to a role that involved groundsmanship duties.
“It was through a friend that I got wind of the position, and Saracens Stadium Manager, Gordon Banks [no, not the Gordon Banks], eventually offered me the job. I’ve only been here since late November, but it’s the best thing I’ve ever done. The culture in rugby is totally different to football. It’s more caring and there’s a great union within the club. We’re all pulling in the same direction with what we want to achieve on the pitch and in the community.”
The decision to move to a new home
The pitch is checked for adequate infill levels before each game
58 PC APRIL/MAY 2013
from their groundsharing period with Watford at Vicarage Road was due in part to the desire from the club, and stadium owners, Barnet Council, to offer the pitch for wider community use. The reconstruction of the Copthall stadium, and the decision by Saracens to lease from the council, was to fulfill the desire of both to marry elite level sport with community use, creating an open community facility in the week and a Premiership rugby venue on match day. The organising committee behind the decision soon realised that synthetic was the only option. “Our aim was to engage the whole community, and the only way we could do it was to build artificial,” explains Scott Murphy, Saracens High Performance Director, who is in charge of training
programmes.
“It was my job to see whether it was feasible based on existing research. The usage we wanted would simply not be possible with a natural construction,” adds the former Brisbane Lions and Bath Rugby man.
Murphy was a key player in the decision to opt for 3G and to look for the best solution to fuse elite with community use. The overwhelming sentiment, so far, is that the right balance has been struck with synthetic. “A real benefit of using synthetic technology is that it complies to standards that have player welfare at the forefront,” adds Scott. “The surface has to meet strict guidelines for things like the Head Impact Criteria (HIC) so, in many ways, it’s more quantifiable and certainly more consistent than natural turf.” “Saracens are confident that time will show artificial turf is a safe and reliable surface for professional rugby.” The new ‘Rugger 65’ carpet has been specifically developed for rugby union and has passed the most rigorous field tests to ensure optimum playing safety and lifetime. In fact, the standards for synthetic surfaces are now arguably more stringent than natural turf. With less variation in firmness, a hard natural pitch, for example in summer, could pose a greater injury risk to players than synthetic.
The Saracens application is the first for the new polyethylene fibre, which is designed to be extremely durable yet soft. “We usually test artificial carpets to 20,000 cycles,” says George Mullan, CEO of Support In Sport (SIS), the manufacturers and installers of the Allianz Park Stadium pitch, as well as the first artificial playing surface for rugby at Newcastle RFC seven years ago. “This surface has been tested to 50,000 cycles under extremely stringent conditions, designed to replicate performance characteristics.” It’s these characteristics that are drawing
Close up of the polyethelene surface
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