The latest news and views from SAPCA RUGBY
WORLD CUP SPECIAL
RUGBY MOVES ONTO NEW SURFACES
An increasing number of rugby venues are opting for hybrid pitches.
During this year’s Rugby World Cup, a total of 25 out of the 40 games will be played on pitches that combine natural grass and plastic fibres
F
or many, the sight of rugby play- ers – international as well as amateur – covered in mud, slip- ping and sliding as they tried to take advantage in the scrum or
a rolling maul is a familiar one. Thankfully, those images are fast receding into history as sports pitch technology advances to pro- vide pitches that allow the technical skills of the players to flourish and fast free flow- ing games to become the norm. At the international level advances in
natural grass pitch construction – and in particular the development of hybrid
pitch technology – has resulted in fast, stable and free draining surfaces. Now installed at Twickenham, Murrayfield, Millennium and Aviva Stadium, the de- velopment by SAPCA member Desso Sports Systems of the Grassmaster sys- tem has set a new standard in natural grass pitch construction. The system incorporates a free
draining sand rootzone into which mono-filament fibres are injected 200mm deep, at 20mm spacing across the pitch, resulting in approximately 20 million fibres (or 40,076 km of yarn)
covering 3 per cent of the total play- ing surface and reinforcing the natural grass. The ingenuity of the system is found below the surface where the natural grass plant roots grow around the plastic fibres, anchoring the pitch together to create stability and rein- forcement, ensuring a uniform surface in good condition at all times. Installed by specialist machines the
The artificial pitch at Saracens’ new home Allianz Park was supplied by SIS
sportsmanagement.co.uk issue 2 2015 © Cybertrek 2015
synthetic turf yarn is injected into root- zone either prior to seeding of the pitch or after the seeding and establishment of the grass sward. Once the grass has established the synthetic fibres are hardly visible within the grass sward. But, if the grass cover is lost through high use the synthetic fibres provide some ‘natural’ looking coverage whilst protecting the crown of the plant and rhizomes to aid a faster recovery of the plant leaf. It is claimed by Desso that the use of Grassmaster increases the carrying capacity of the pitch from a typical 200 to 300 hours per annum to around 900 hours and if growing lights, etc. are used this can be increased fur- ther to around 1000 hours. While the use of the Desso Grass-
master system or alternative hybrid technologies from SAPCA members SIS and Greenfields has greatly improved
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