The Wembley pitch

McGrath5

Why is it that we keep on hearing so much about the pitch at Wembley?
It seems the playing surface in this arena is constantly undermining the games been held there, only on Sunday it was been criticised yet again http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/football/8616969.stm
I was reading on the bbc website today that it is going to be relaid for the 10th time in about 3 years.
What is it that makes this stadium unique with regards to playing to surface? Surely whoever was designing/engineering this stadium only very recently would have taken something so basic into consideration.
We rarely hear of problem's with playing surface's in other high profile stadium's in the UK like Old Trafford or The Emirate's or elsewhere in Europe.

Hopefully the lads laying the pitch at Lansdowne Road will get it right

I think it's hilarious tbh.

Dancor

Its a right mess alright. Must be very embarressing for the FA. I doubt concerts, american rugby, motorsports and two games in one weekend help it.

matrim

For the Villa game, I think alot of the problem wasn't the quality of the pitch but it was that they watered between the warmup and the players coming back out so it was very slippy and players kept loosing their footing

McGrath5

Crazy stuff considering the place cost £750m to build.

everdead.ie

The main problem is that it's there show piece stadium that they can't stop and start on it the grass is different to usual as is the make up of the sand and soil underneath to deal with the concerts etc.

Mitch Connor

They spent too much time (and money) trying to build an amazing stadium - without thinking of what effects their decisions would have on the actual pitch. the stadium is too big, blocking wind and light from getting to the pitch, the air doesn't circulate (the gaps in the Emirates and similar stadiums is there for a reason).

It is a fantastic building, but a poor designed stadium when looking at the centre piece - the pitch.

ctrl-alt-delete

Why wouldn't it be in bits with all the stuff that goes on there, sure they even have motorsport on it with that race of champions thing.

Good grass needs time, and it never gets it at Wembley with them hosting everything and anything to get as much of the £800 million as they can back.

As the BBC says, lets hope it doesn't have to come to this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bv2Y8SGp9aM

event

the problem is that the pitch has to be taken out for concerts and other events.
normally when a pitch is relaid it stays in the ground itself and is given time to bed down.
a different type of grass has to be used as the pitch is constantly being removed from the ground for the numerous events that are needed to finance the stadium itself

Mitch Connor

ctrl-alt-delete wrote: »

Why wouldn't it be in bits with all the stuff that goes on there, sure they even have motorsport on it with that race of champions thing.

No more done on it than on any of the premiership teams.

ctrl-alt-delete

Mitch Connor wrote: »

No more done on it than on any of the premiership teams.

Of course there is.

Mitch Connor

ctrl-alt-delete wrote: »

Of course there is.

So, there are 25 senior competitive football matches, a couple of friendlies, open training sessions once or twice a year, maybe a couple of youth cup games a few Rugby matches and some other stuff, as is done at Old Trafford every year.

3hn2givr7mx1sc

Mitch Connor wrote: »

So, there are 25 senior competitive football matches, a couple of friendlies, open training sessions once or twice a year, maybe a couple of youth cup games a few Rugby matches and some other stuff, as is done at Old Trafford every year.

The worst stuff-concerts and motorsport.

ctrl-alt-delete

Mitch Connor wrote: »

So, there are 25 senior competitive football matches, a couple of friendlies, open training sessions once or twice a year, maybe a couple of youth cup games a few Rugby matches and some other stuff, as is done at Old Trafford every year.

Well there were 12 concerts in 2009 alone, i don't think Old Trafford has hosted that many?

parker kent

Mitch Connor wrote: »

So, there are 25 senior competitive football matches, a couple of friendlies, open training sessions once or twice a year, maybe a couple of youth cup games a few Rugby matches and some other stuff, as is done at Old Trafford every year.

As said above the problems relate to non-football related events. Other premiership pitches are designed with football in mind, Wembley is designed with everything in mind. It is constantly being removed and relaid after whatever crap they have on to help pay the bills. This quote kind of sums it up well!

The bad news for people paying through the nose to watch matches and eat £7 chilli dogs at this soulless white elephant is that the dreadful fibre-turf pitch is unlikely to be replaced with a seeded Desso equivalent of the kind grown at the Emirates, among other Premier League grounds. Such turf takes three months to bed in and can't be stored in a nearby warehouse during monster truck rallies or Muse gigs, rendering it unsuitable for a stadium that cost so much it's forced to stage a minimum of two rugby matches, seven football matches, three rock concerts and an American Football game between now and the end of October just to keep the bank manager happy.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2010/apr/12/five-things-learned-watching-football

x in the city

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/79/Cowboysstadium_js_crop.jpg

the yanks love outlandish spectacular stadia you have to hand it down to them