“We’ve had to call the club doctor to two of our players who are suffering from crocodile bites!”
John Huxley with Andy Warham
construction installed ten years ago. The pitch was stripped down to a depth of 600mm and topsoil and subsoil was removed from site. A new primary drainage system was installed at five metre centres and covered with a 150mm gravel layer. On top of this went 100mm of 6mm clean grit, then 200mm of medium washed sand and, finally, 100mm of Fibresand.
Andy Walley on Husqvarna Rotary Training ground
John then had to learn how to manage his sand based pitch, with the art of watering and feeding being crucial to its performance, together with the need to aerate on a regular basis to prevent the pitch becoming hard. For the past three years, end of season renovation has involved the koroing off of the surface vegetation, applying new fibresand materials to maintain the top 100mm and oversowing. However, this year John changed his end of season renovations preferring to keep some of the existing grass. “At the end of the season, the grass is just coming into its growing period and is looking the best it has for probably four months, so why take it off ” says John. So, this year, Beryn Evans from ALS came over to carry out the work. This involved mowing down the sward, scarifying out unwanted debris, collecting and disposing of the arisings, topdressing and overseeding with Bar 7. The results have been good with,
Training ground
no doubt, the copious amounts of rainfall throughout the summer helping out.
The stadium pitch is mowed on a daily basis through the growing season using the Allett mowers, striping in traditional six metre bands.
The perimeter of the pitch, behind goals and up to the touch lines, is mown at 30mm. This helps protect the grass, especially through the winter months. The playing area is maintained between 22-25mm, depending on the time of the year, with grass in the goalmouths kept between 25-27mm.
During a typical week, work usually begins straight after a match when the three groundstaff spend around ninety minutes repairing any large divots and scars. Andy comes in on the Sunday morning to sort out the smaller divots and to mow the pitch.
On Monday hel mow again and overseeds any divot marks. There is often a match on Tuesday evenings, so Andy and John spend the day mowing and marking out in readiness. Wednesday and Thursday is spent mowing and, on Friday, mowing and marking for the Saturday game begins. Line marking is carried out with a Kombi linemarker using Pitchmarker C paint. String lines are used every time.
On the morning of the match the staff arrive at 9.00am, check over the
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