Tag Archive for: Football

Flood relief at Caersws Football Club

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Flood relief at Caersws Football Club: Caersws Football Club, founded in the late 19th century, adopted its present name in 1974 when it relinquished its amateur status. The club’s first successes came in the nineteen sixties, winning the Mid-Wales League and the Welsh Amateur Cup.

In 1992 they became founder members of the League of Wales and subsequently won the League Cup twice. The team plays at the Recreation Ground, Caersws, which accommodates up to 4000 spectators.

Flood relief at Caersws Football Club

Flood relief at Caersws Football Club

Situated close to the River Severn, the ground floods regularly when the river bursts its banks in winter months. But once the flood water subsided, the pitch would not be playable for up to 2 weeks due standing water on the pitch not draining away. This resulted in the club having to move matches to another club’s ground, which had a 3G pitch, to meet the demands of the league schedule. In the 2023/24 season, they managed only one game across three winter months (Nov-Jan). Playing elsewhere also meant supporters would not travel to games, so the issues mounted. Investigations into the causes revealed the pitch to be sitting on 0.7 metres depth of clay and constant rolling over the years had compacted the surface even further. Normal aeration would have no impact on the problem.

Caersws Club chair, Neil Lewis, had heard of the work by Terrain Aeration at other pitches and called them in to see if they could resolve the issue. Terrain has a unique system used for over thirty years with their Terralift machines. The Terralift features a JCB road hammer and probe, which reaches a depth of one metre where it releases a blast of compressed air. This fractures the soil, creating fissures to allow drainage, and as the probe is withdrawn, dried seaweed is injected. This has the effect of expanding and contracting with moisture and, in simple terms, keeps the holes open. The process is repeated on a grid system, usually at two-metre intervals, to interlink the fracturing. The probe holes are backfilled with an aggregate and the surface is almost immediately playable.

“This season we had only one first team and a second team game postponed,” says Neil Lewis. “We had the Ground Management Association come and take a core sample. They found even though the topsoil was wet, the soil at depth was dry. We have also had the pitch scarified to remove thatch, so next season will see it drain even better. The difference since Terrain Aeration did their work is incredible and we will promote them to other club and associations looking for a drainage solution. It saved money, there was no digging and being non-invasive, we were able to play a pre-season friendly the same night as the work was done. Why would you not do it?”

Terrain Aeration 01449 673783 www.terrainaeration.co.uk

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Kubota or nothing for Watford Football Club

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Kubota or nothing for Watford Football Club: When it comes to tractors, it’s Kubota or nothing for Scott Tingley, Grounds Manager at Watford Football Club.

The club’s Kubota STW40 is proof that compact doesn’t have to mean compromise when it comes to providing the reliable power for maintenance operations at Vicarage Road, while a Kubota L2-622 delivers impressive versatility at the training ground.

Kubota or nothing for Watford Football Club

Kubota or nothing for Watford Football Club

Performance

The dependable performance of the pair is matched by a fleet of four Kubota RTV’s used across both sites.

Scott is into his 9th season at the club and oversees the home of The Hornets with a team of three, and the 27 pitches at Watford’s training ground. “On the Vicarage Road stadium pitch, it’s all about weight – we need something small and compact, with enough horsepower to lift all the various implements we use” he explains. The solution, for the last seven years, has been a Kubota STW40.

“We look after the tractor well and, in return, it looks after us. It’s small, lightweight and at 40hp can operate our seeder or aerator for example without leaving much of a footprint.” Scott continues, “All of our Kubota equipment is incredibly reliable, we’ve had no issues with this tractor at all.”

At the training ground, the delivery of an L2-622 from dealers George Browns Ltd in October 2022 is delivering even more versatility “We’re yet to find anything we can’t do with this tractor! Together with powering implements, the forks and bucket are invaluable for moving pallets around, managing deliveries or loading topdressing into our spreader. It makes every task quicker and easier.”

“The cruise control feature on the Kubota L2-622 is especially important when we’re aerating at the training ground as, by setting the speed, we get consistency across all the surfaces” he adds. “It’s also incredibly user-friendly to operate which is important to aid the training and efficiency of some of our newer and younger team members.”

RTV’s

Complementing the pair of compact tractors across the two sites are four RTV’s, including two RTV520’s installed by George Browns at the training ground in July 2023. “Here, especially, the RTV’s are the workhorses of our maintenance operation.

Whether its moving equipment from pitch to pitch or transporting clippings, they’re our go-to. At the stadium we have a Kubota RTV500 which, again, is a people and machinery mover. We also use this to tow our lighting rigs into place after a match which shaves an hour off the job.”

Scott concludes by praising the after-sales support from the Kubota dealer, “On the odd occasion we’ve needed help with our Kubota equipment, George Browns have always been brilliant. With high levels of usage and even higher expectations it’s reassuring to know we can always rely on Kubota to get the job done.”

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Vandals destroy football pitches

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Vandals destroy football pitches: Two Northside football clubs say they’ve been left devastated after their pitches were vandalised last weekend.

Read the full article from the FM104 here

Groundsman to play on his 'sacred' pitch

Groundsman to play on his ‘sacred’ pitch

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Football Foundation to power up grass pitches

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Football Foundation to power up grass pitches: The Premier League, The FA and Government’s Football Foundation has today announced the launch of its ‘Power Up Your Grass Pitch’ campaign, which will revolutionise the state of grass football pitches in England.

The country’s biggest sports charity is on a mission to improve over 7,000 grass pitches by 2024 and 20,000 by 2030, to ensure the 12 million grassroots football players across the country have great places to play.

Football Foundation to power up grass pitches

Football Foundation to power up grass pitches

Around 87% of affiliated football is played on grass pitches, and with over 150,000 matches cancelled due to poor pitch quality during the last football season alone, play is often brought to a halt. The improvements brought about thanks to the Football Foundations work will make these cancellations a thing of the past. Further more if the improvements are achieved, by 2030 grassroots football pitches in England will be able to facilitate an additional 30,000 matches per week.

Improving facilities means that more people across England will get to enjoy playing the nation’s favourite sport, transforming people’s physical and mental wellbeing, as well as supporting local communities and economies.

To help make this ambition a reality, the Football Foundation has developed an app which is now being rolled out across the country. ‘PitchPower’ is an online tool that gives every community football club and organisation in the country the ability to carry out their own grass pitch inspections, providing fast and accurate data which is less time intensive and more efficient than in person inspections. Once an inspection is submitted, Regional Pitch Advisers at the Grounds Management Association produce an assessment report with bespoke advice and recommendations to improve the grass pitch quality at a site.

By using this tool more widely, the Football Foundation anticipates it will be able to carry out as many as 20,000 inspections a year, five times as many as in the past. In its trial phase, PitchPower has helped to inspect almost 5,000 pitches. These inspections have led to 446 grants being issued worth £8.6m, all of which has gone towards improving 1,564 pitches.

Once inspections have been completed via the PitchPower app – clubs and facilities are then eligible to apply for funding from the Football Foundation to support pitch improvements identified through the app.

Along with PitchPower unlocking funding, clubs and organisations will also be encouraged to upskill their workforce by having access to a range of free courses from the Grounds Management Association and join a community of professional and amateur groundskeepers on the free Football Foundation Groundskeeping Community App.

Robert Sullivan, Football Foundation Chief Executive Officer, said:

“Millions of players are left disappointed every year when their matches are cancelled due to poor quality pitches, something the Football Foundation and its partners are working tirelessly to prevent. We have made some ambitious targets when it comes to improving grass pitches – we want to get 20,000 pitches to ‘good’ quality by 2030 – to ensure no games are called off because of a poor quality pitch.

“Thanks to funding from the Premier League, The FA and Government our dedicated teams will be working hard to ensure clubs and facilities across the country have the support and resource they need to power up their grass pitches.”

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Youth football pitches wrecked

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Youth football pitches wrecked: Five pitches maintained by Aspull Juniors FC were churned up and left unusable after reports on social media that there was a quad bike riding on the grass last week.

Read the full article from Wigan Today here

https://turfmatters.co.uk/gma-supports-launch-of-new-sports-turf-apprenticeship/

https://turfmatters.co.uk/gma-supports-launch-of-new-sports-turf-apprenticeship/

For the latest industry news visit turfmatters.co.uk/news

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