As another long season nears completion for the players, coaches and backroom staff there is another vital part of a football club that is tired and feeling the strain of a long dark winter…. the Training Ground pitches. Grounds staff all over the country have had a particularly tough season with the effects of climate change clear for all to see. From the record high temperatures of the summer and the abnormally cold December, to the warmest New Years Day and the wettest March since records began, the grounds staff have worked against the weather to keep pitches both on the training grounds and in the stadia up the standard elite sport requires.
In conjunction with Head of Grounds and under their supervision, White Horse Contractors begin the process of ‘out with the old and in with the new.’ The process begins with the removal of organic matter in the ‘thatch layer’ of the grass sward from the surface of the pitch. This encourages deeper, stronger root formation, improves drainage and improves aeration to create a stronger plant. The ‘Koro’ing’ off of the old surface removes the top 20 - 25mm of organic matter. This is the first in a multi-stage process depending on playing surface. Whether natural turf, fibre sand or hybrid turf sportsturf pitch the process is similar although the machinery are very different.
