Winter Sports - Football
O
xford United FC has a lot to look forward to this season, with promotion to League One and home games on a new pitch at the Kassam Stadium which has
proved to offer significant improvements in quality and consistency in its first season. Leicester City, who played their only English pre-season friendly against Oxford United in front of a 9,000-strong crowd in July, and who know a thing or two about rising fortunes, were highly complimentary about the new XtraGrass pitch, just seven weeks after its first annual renovation. XtraGrass supplier GreenFields (Sports
Surfaces) UK Ltd installed the new pitch in summer 2015, and is closely involved with its ongoing maintenance as part of the contract
with Oxford United’s management. It is a hybrid system which features the
reinforcement of natural grass with artificial turf, generating a high wear capacity capable of delivering up to 1,000 hours per annum, whilst providing a consistently stable playing surface to significantly reduce the number of injuries. The stadium, which has a 12,500 capacity, is named after Firoz Kassam, a businessman and former chairman who purchased the club in 1999, and hosted its first football match on 4th August 2001. As well as being the home to Oxford United, the stadium has hosted a rugby club in the past, and the durability of any new pitch to cope with dual use - should it be required - was an important consideration.
At the end of the 2014/15 season, the full
sized 114m x 73m (8,322m²) carpet was installed widthways over the contours of the pitch in 3650mm wide rolls, with the rolls then seamed together by GreenFields specialist seaming team. Grass seed was then applied which, when fully grown, constituted up to 93% natural grass per m². For a professional finish, synthetic turf was used to provide logo mats around the pitch which incorporates the GreenFields logo and the club’s classic ox head logo. The quality of the new pitch at the Kassam
Stadium has been recognised by more than just players - it was chosen by the International Football Pitch Advisory (IFPA) as the most improved pitch from the 2015/16 season in League Two.
PC AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2016 I 81
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