| The Pitch 10:44 - Feb 5 with 39181 views | dawlishdale |
I know there are plenty of comments about the pitch, but I think it needs it's own thread.
I'm frankly appalled at how quickly the pitch has gone from being perfectly good to being not fit for purpose.
Yesterday, after arriving at my dad's following a 6 hour journey, he said that he'd like to come to the game with me. He used to assist the groundsmen at both cricket & bowls locally, so he's not a complete novice in pitch maintenance matters.
His immediate comment on entering the ground and seeing the state of the pitch was "it's been laid wrong". On questioning him, he was adamant that from what little he could see the roots of the grass were suffering, there was far too much sand within it's structure and more worryingly, it looks like there are once again big problems with the drainage.
His conclusion was that "it'll have to come up and be re done as soon as possible"
In addition, he didn't think that playing Rugby on it was making it any worse.
I think it's time that the club actually made an official comment about the pitch, as we seem to spend a huge sum of money on it each season, but it hasn't been good enough this year. Have we done anything different to previous years that would contribute to it's poor condition?
What worries me, is that the weather has so far been kind to us, both in terms of temperature and rainfall, so how much worse would it be in a bad spell?
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| The Pitch on 19:42 - Feb 9 with 6355 views | nordenblue |
| The Pitch on 19:07 - Feb 9 by 442Dale |
The floodlights are on so there could be work going on on the pitch tonight, massive hill of what looks like sand in the car park too. |
I'm pretty sure the sand is only good for a temporary fix and surely causes more problems further down the line?
Either way something needs doing and you'd like to think "they" know what they're doing.... | | | |
| The Pitch on 20:18 - Feb 9 with 6289 views | 442Dale |
| The Pitch on 19:42 - Feb 9 by nordenblue |
I'm pretty sure the sand is only good for a temporary fix and surely causes more problems further down the line?
Either way something needs doing and you'd like to think "they" know what they're doing.... |
It was dark - looked from other end of the car park. Could have been something else, but when sand was used at this time last season it didn't do much damage and the pitch played pretty well. The problems with sand in the past, notably the late 90s, were due to the drainage being so knackered that any rain turned the pitch into a sludgey mess.
I remember a plea to help fork the pitch ahead of an AWS game v Wigan in '99; it was necessary to lift up whole chunks of the pitch to ensure the water went beneath the surface. It was akin to a beach as the tide goes out. That was the season that saw ties v Stoke and Halifax being played away when we were drawn at home. |  |
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| The Pitch on 09:37 - Feb 10 with 6126 views | SiDale |
They have completely removed the turf. |  | | |
| The Pitch on 10:11 - Feb 10 with 6058 views | nordenblue |
| The Pitch on 09:37 - Feb 10 by SiDale |
They have completely removed the turf. |
Surely a new pitch can't take in 8 days??!!! | | | |
| The Pitch on 16:25 - Feb 10 with 5806 views | MoonyDale |
Pics on official site now, the whole playing surface has been taken up. No way on god's green earth will that turf bed in for next Saturday...... |  |
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| The Pitch on 17:16 - Feb 10 with 5667 views | Shun |
Quite a drastic approach. This to me seems like the biggest sign yet that not only are the board striving to reach The Championship, but they believe this is the best chance we've ever had of achieving that goal. They could simply have left the pitch as it was and 'made do' until the end of the season with measures such as the sand that we've used in previous seasons. Perhaps the Hogan money has emboldened them a bit, as spending what I presume must be a significant amount midway through the season just so we have an optimum playing surface (unprecedented for Rochdale) to me shows how strong that desire to reach The Championship is. |  | | |
| The Pitch on 17:19 - Feb 10 with 5662 views | judd |
I hope they've not misunderstood what the cops said when they donated those lights "for growing grass." |  |
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| The Pitch on 17:36 - Feb 10 with 5600 views | since58 |
| The Pitch on 17:16 - Feb 10 by Shun |
Quite a drastic approach. This to me seems like the biggest sign yet that not only are the board striving to reach The Championship, but they believe this is the best chance we've ever had of achieving that goal. They could simply have left the pitch as it was and 'made do' until the end of the season with measures such as the sand that we've used in previous seasons. Perhaps the Hogan money has emboldened them a bit, as spending what I presume must be a significant amount midway through the season just so we have an optimum playing surface (unprecedented for Rochdale) to me shows how strong that desire to reach The Championship is. |
Maybe the contractors are putting a fook up right. [Post edited 10 Feb 2017 18:40]
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| The Pitch on 18:40 - Feb 10 with 5470 views | nordenblue |
| The Pitch on 17:36 - Feb 10 by since58 |
Maybe the contractors are putting a fook up right. [Post edited 10 Feb 2017 18:40]
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That's not what's happened,the club are doing it off their own back | | | |
| The Pitch on 19:10 - Feb 10 with 5383 views | dingdangblue |
| The Pitch on 17:16 - Feb 10 by Shun |
Quite a drastic approach. This to me seems like the biggest sign yet that not only are the board striving to reach The Championship, but they believe this is the best chance we've ever had of achieving that goal. They could simply have left the pitch as it was and 'made do' until the end of the season with measures such as the sand that we've used in previous seasons. Perhaps the Hogan money has emboldened them a bit, as spending what I presume must be a significant amount midway through the season just so we have an optimum playing surface (unprecedented for Rochdale) to me shows how strong that desire to reach The Championship is. |
We've got the FA cup money too |  |
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| The Pitch on 21:22 - Feb 10 with 5138 views | robbowood |
| The Pitch on 17:16 - Feb 10 by Shun |
Quite a drastic approach. This to me seems like the biggest sign yet that not only are the board striving to reach The Championship, but they believe this is the best chance we've ever had of achieving that goal. They could simply have left the pitch as it was and 'made do' until the end of the season with measures such as the sand that we've used in previous seasons. Perhaps the Hogan money has emboldened them a bit, as spending what I presume must be a significant amount midway through the season just so we have an optimum playing surface (unprecedented for Rochdale) to me shows how strong that desire to reach The Championship is. |
Great credit to the club for taking this action
It will not be cheap and no doubt a large six figure sum is involved - but then we almost certainly have never had such a large amount of money in Dale bank a/c [thanks to Scott Hogan]
Hopefully (baring a disastrous spell of weather in the coming weeks) it will mean at the end on the season there will be little work needed to be done on the pitch compared to previous seasons
Hopefully we can get all our injured players back asap to benefit from the 'new' pitch | | | |
| The Pitch on 19:32 - Feb 13 with 4622 views | hxdale |
Do anybody got an update on the pitch.? |  | | |
| The Pitch on 19:42 - Feb 13 with 4582 views | Nerazzurri |
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| The Pitch on 19:48 - Feb 13 with 4545 views | rafc1977 |
I'm sure this is a daft question as it must surely have been covered prior todecision being taken to replace the pitch but......
What's to stop a pitch (that by the looks of it) will be finished being laid on a Tuesday, and 4 days later a professional football game being played on it going to hold up? I just can't think of how in 4 days it'll knit together to survive sliding tackles/slidiing celebrations?
Fair play to the club, there's been a problem and they've rectified it, I just hope they have enough time! |  | | |
| The Pitch on 20:14 - Feb 13 with 4470 views | ChaffRAFC |
We wouldn't have done it if they didn't have full confidence in it being ready. The club are very careful when it comes to spending money so if it was deemed to be a risk, I doubt they'd have forked out for the pitch to be replaced.
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| If I hadn't seen such riches, I could live with being poor |
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| The Pitch on 20:21 - Feb 13 with 4449 views | 442Dale |
| The Pitch on 20:14 - Feb 13 by ChaffRAFC |
We wouldn't have done it if they didn't have full confidence in it being ready. The club are very careful when it comes to spending money so if it was deemed to be a risk, I doubt they'd have forked out for the pitch to be replaced.
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That's good hoe you did that. | |
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| The Pitch on 20:29 - Feb 13 with 4424 views | ColDale |
Will the pitch work still take place in the Summer or is this an alternative to that? |  | | |
| The Pitch on 20:32 - Feb 13 with 4412 views | 442Dale |
| The Pitch on 20:29 - Feb 13 by ColDale |
Will the pitch work still take place in the Summer or is this an alternative to that? |
The grass is grown from scratch in the summer, doesn't this method have a more limited shelf life?
The issue appeared to the overall structure and make-up of the pitch last year so maybe this sorted it and it'll bed in. | |
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| The Pitch on 20:51 - Feb 13 with 4372 views | scarrow |
| The Pitch on 20:29 - Feb 13 by ColDale |
Will the pitch work still take place in the Summer or is this an alternative to that? |
Can't see the club spending on this and then ripping it up again in three months. It'll be remedial work only in the summer id guess. [Post edited 13 Feb 2017 20:52]
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| The Pitch on 21:16 - Feb 13 with 4313 views | Yorkshire_Dale |
| The Pitch on 20:51 - Feb 13 by scarrow |
Can't see the club spending on this and then ripping it up again in three months. It'll be remedial work only in the summer id guess. [Post edited 13 Feb 2017 20:52]
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This lot must be costing us a fortune,,,,,,Looks like the bogs will have to wait and we suffer the smell of Grimsby for a couple more months then?
Just when we thought we did have a pot to piss in. | | | |
| The Pitch on 22:17 - Feb 13 with 4173 views | mikehunt |
Aye. That's the Hogan money gone - a pound per blade of grass. :-) |  |
| The worm of time turns not for the cuckoo of circumstance. |
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| The Pitch on 22:49 - Feb 13 with 4089 views | dingdangblue |
| The Pitch on 20:14 - Feb 13 by ChaffRAFC |
We wouldn't have done it if they didn't have full confidence in it being ready. The club are very careful when it comes to spending money so if it was deemed to be a risk, I doubt they'd have forked out for the pitch to be replaced.
This post has been edited by an administrator |
Not knowing a lot about laying new turf football pitches - is there a reason why the old pitch was ripped up Friday and it's now 3 days ( nearly 4 ) later only just being laid? Does it take that long to prepare? There was mention of tonnes of soil/sand on the car park which I prusume has had to be put down and rolled flat? Or has the weather been an issue? It does seem an awful short time for it to bed down - there's 2 games on it next weekend. In an ideal world both games should be moved to a different venue but I guess we don't have that option. | |
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| The Pitch on 15:59 - Feb 14 with 3640 views | MoonyDale |
This new surface has 96 hours to bed in and knit together, not a hope in hell no matter how many lamps are being used on it or if fertiliser from the crap of a thousand horses is scattered around. 2 games on it at the weekend I read above? Both should be called off in my opinion..... | |
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| The Pitch on 15:59 - Feb 14 with 3639 views | DaleiLama |
| The Pitch on 22:49 - Feb 13 by dingdangblue |
Not knowing a lot about laying new turf football pitches - is there a reason why the old pitch was ripped up Friday and it's now 3 days ( nearly 4 ) later only just being laid? Does it take that long to prepare? There was mention of tonnes of soil/sand on the car park which I prusume has had to be put down and rolled flat? Or has the weather been an issue? It does seem an awful short time for it to bed down - there's 2 games on it next weekend. In an ideal world both games should be moved to a different venue but I guess we don't have that option. |
All explained here, including removal of 470T of old pitch.
[Post edited 14 Feb 2017 16:04]
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