Green and pleasant turf

As a World Cup qualifier kicks off on artificial turf, Polytan and the FA tell Host City how this market is growing in the UK on a grass roots level

The UK may claim to be the home of football, but it has dragged its heels in one particular development in the game – the uptake of synthetic turf on the professional level. “Professional set-ups have not accepted artificial grass for match play, largely because of the poor second generation pitches installed by some clubs in the 1980s,” says Steve Williams, National Facilities Manager at the Football Association (FA).

Even the Vatican City’s training facility for priests has a LigaTurf pitch

However, perceptions are changing with the advent of high performance “third-generation” (3G) turf. Influential figures now recognise that natural is not always best. “Natural grass is ideal in some cases, but not in all,” says Williams. “It can suffer from a lack of maintenance and budget, or from overplay when first team, reserves and youth teams play in excess of 100 matches season.”

Although artificial surfaces also need to be maintained, overplay is less of an issue and there are many other benefits. Williams says: “There are lots of pluses, such as not having to put your reserves out on a different pitch. They allow for all competitions outside of the FA cup. And artificial grass provides for training as well as match play.”

Top class training
Manufacturer and installer of artificial sports surfaces Polytan has been at the forefront of improvements in football turf. In the UK, 3G product LigaTurf has proved extremely popular in top-level training facilities. This is because it offers virtually identical playing properties to natural grass, yet can be used as often as needed – which means there is no need to build or rent additional facilities. Andy Shaw, managing director of Polytan UK says: “When we installed a Polytan surface in Liverpool’s new academy in 1998 it was one of the first academies to be set up in the UK. After 11 years of use, we have just completely replaced the surface with state-of-the-art LigaTurf.”

Over the last two years, LigaTurf has also been installed at new training grounds at Everton FC and Hibernian FC. Celtic FC and Aston Villa have also had LigaTurf installed in their training grounds.

Inside the stadium
Synthetic turf has clear advantages inside the stadium too. “There are opportunities to maximise use of the stadium and create extra revenue streams,” says Shaw. In the Stade de Suisse in Bern, for example, they were able to host a Robbie Williams gig days before a match.

Football clubs in the UK are also beginning to realise the benefits. The Welsh Premier League side The New Saints and Scottish 3rd division team Montrose FC both have LigaTurf installed in their stadiums. In England, successful installations at Woodley Sports and Durham City in the Unibond league are raising the profile of artificial turf.

But although the Football Association permits the use of synthetic turf in all of its tournaments apart from the FA Cup, England’s professional leagues have not yet given it the green light. Williams says: “If these teams were to progress to the Conference they’d have to put natural turf down again. The issue for a lot of clubs is that they can’t put a surface down in the knowledge that they might have to take it up again.”

Good for community, good for football
According to Williams, the Football Foundation currently has funding available for artificial grass pitches for community use. They have set a standard of a minimum of 80 hours of use per week to make the most of the installation, he says. Partnerships with Rugby Football Union (RFU) and local councils are bringing some projects to fruition.

“It’s a question of trying to help each other,” says Williams. “The community benefits from the availability of a facility in the local area in the knowledge that it’s going to be cared for, clean and accessible. And I think it has to be good for football.”

Shaw envisages a situation in which football clubs use their artificial grass pitch for matches at weekends during the football season and rent it for community use during weekdays and in the summer months. “Artificial grass creates more use from the local community,” he says. “If the local school kids play on it during the day in an inner city area, they come on Saturday to watch, and before you know it the situation has improved, with more people on the turnstiles.”

International uptake
While the benefits of artificial turf remain denied to England’s professional sides for the time being, international professional football has moved faster. “You can play in World Cup qualifiers using these pitches – you are going to see Russia versus Germany in a World Cup qualifier in Moscow’s Luzhniki stadium in October 2009,” Williams says.

But disparity exists internationally too. After the qualifying match between England and Russia for Euro 2008 in this stadium, the artificial turf pitch had to be converted back to natural grass for the 2008 UEFA’s Champions League final. Similarly, Salzburg’s Red Bull Arena and Bern’s Stade de Suisse had to be converted to natural for EURO 2006.

Williams envisages a repeat of this scenario at Luzhniki later this year. “While FIFA may come out and say yes, until there is a change towards playing in the higher echelons of the game, it just suffers the same agony of not being accepted.”

In the meantime, the situation continues to improve. “There is a lot of injury research going on to get around these issues.” says Williams.

Mike Soblys, Sales Manager at Polytan in Germany says: “Systems have advanced so much that it’s seen as having a lot of advantages as compared with natural grass. With the acceptance growing and systems performing better and longer all the time I think there’s a good future for it.”

For more information, visit www.thefa.com/GetIntoFootball/Facilities/Artificial_Pitches.aspx and www.polytan.com