Winter Sports - Rugby League


The Princess Street stand


restaurant, classroom, match day press office and VIP lounge, coaches offices and video room, general offices and hospitality boxes. The Tiger Bar and marquee area double up as a match day bar. A new purpose built gym, costing £50,000, has just been erected (which can be removed) and there’s also a newly furbished wrestle room. “The main pitch has decent air flow


through the open ends of the stadium,” details Stuart, “but suffers with shade on one side due to the length of the stand and roof. Frosts and heavy dew take time to lift and move off, which slows up our early


morning starts. The training pitch is open, so doesn’t suffer with anything really, except the odd rabbit!” Stuart currently has one apprentice to


assist him, twenty-two year old Rob Lilley; “he’s also the club’s mascot on match days!” “Through the season, the height of cut is


kept between 35mm and 50mm, which I will lower or raise, depending on the weather conditions or quantity of games, to try and protect the surface. With a season that runs from February to October, we can experience everything that Mother Nature has to offer; from snow to floods to drought!”


The club mascot enjoying a spot of reading Through the non-playing winter months,


the pitch is kept at 60mm. “I will cut the stadium pitch at least three


times a week during the season, and also on the day of the game, using a John Deere 2653a cylinder mower. A lot of the games are a Sunday afternoon kick off at 3.30pm but, since Sky Sport started televising the Super League, we also have Thursday, Friday and Saturday matches with 8.00pm kick offs. If that’s the case, and weather permitting, we will cut on game day morning and mark out in the afternoon. That will be a lot less in winter months as the pitch gets too wet to


PC FEBRUARY/MARCH 2015 I 43


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