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The worst pitch in the division?


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It looks awful - and we are not the only club that suffers bad weather.

 

It seems to have been a handicap for the last few seasons - wonder how many points we lose due to it? How many supporters do we lose because it's impossible to play good football.

 

Feels like we need to do something in the closed season to rectify this for next season.

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Yes. The pitch is :censored:e and I'm not going to pretend I know why or what the solution is. We can't even use the rugby as an excuse anymore.

 

I'm with JSS, though. I actually think it helped us survive last season and I don't think the deterioration of our pitch coinciding with better results at home this season is a coincidence.

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It looks awful - and we are not the only club that suffers bad weather.

 

It seems to have been a handicap for the last few seasons - wonder how many points we lose due to it? How many supporters do we lose because it's impossible to play good football.

 

Feels like we need to do something in the closed season to rectify this for next season.

I'm pretty confident Millwall would have turned us over had the pitch been in better condition. I think it works massively in our favour as it did last season. We haven't outplayed a team all season so a pitch that suits a team of grafters over a team of footballers suits us in my opinion.

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Fair point on the advantage / disadvantage balance - might even out, or might favour us (but less than a plastic pitch that you could learn to play on - this is disintegrating each week and therefore we have to adapt every week).

 

But in terms of preventing good open, flowing football that might attract and retain supporters - by entertaining them - surely that is clear?

 

 

I'd hope that Sheridan would make a request / demand for improved surface next season.

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It's the worst pitch in the top 5 leagues barring Newport, it stems from penny pinching and a reluctance to spend any money on anything related to the football team, it's embarrassing really and the fact some of our fans describe it as an asset to our survival is a little strange.

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What you get for spending a bomb on a plastic entwined surface that lasts 10 years and keeping it for 15.

Yeh agree the pitch is dated from when this was done. But not every lower league club has had this work and they manage to grow and maintain good grass each year. Appreciate investment may be needed but certainly not the only issue for us having a garbage pitch?

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On what grounds is there an assumption we loss points rather than gain because of it?

We play on it regularly. The opposition play on it once. It can and should be used to our advantage.

This. Millwall are soft southern Jessies who just didn't fancy playing on our (cabbage) patch...
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Yeh agree the pitch is dated from when this was done. But not every lower league club has had this work and they manage to grow and maintain good grass each year. Appreciate investment may be needed but certainly not the only issue for us having a garbage pitch?

It is solely down to investment. This is further compunded by the type of pitch we have. When TTA were all open palms they spent a fair bit on an [at the time] innovative new pitch which, if maintained at around 80% of whatever the full price is, would still be a very good pitch now.

However if you don't keep up with the higher level summer work it will deteriorate faster than a 'normal' grass pitch, especially if you factor in our weather and also playing other sports on it.

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Just because we played on a bog 40 years ago it doesn't mean we should use it as an excuse to have a joke of a pitch now, most Conference teams as well as National Leagues North and South manage to provide a decent surface to play on despite playing far more fixture than we do, it stems from penny pinching and as great a job as some say our ground staff do covering it with an inch of sand and a few plastic sheets is hardly revolutionary.

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I sit here looking out over a newly drained cricket outfield which has surface water. Either the money spent on the drains was a waste of time or the weather is somewhat unusual. I think it is a bit of both with the water table higher than usual - lots of places I walk my dogs are wetter and muddier than I can remember.

 

I also walk past our bowling green every morning and since that was deep hollow tined last year have not seen any surface water unlike last summer. The bowling green however doesn't have anybody walking on it.

 

My conclusion is that the work which was done last summer on the pitch was a failure and things are worse than they otherwise would be because of the wet weather.

 

The next two weeks are cold and wet so the pitch will not recover before the Bury game. Ground staff are up against it.

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I thought Moore put this pitch in? I may be wrong on that but I seem to remember it being Moore who invested heavily in the pitch.

Possibly. Then TTA carried on at the top premium for a few years. I was using Tractorgate in my head as an anchor and feeling out either side for pitch related information!

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