WORLD CUP WINNING SURFACES
Men's competitions will continue to use natural or hybrid surfaces
by TurfPro Editor, Steve Gibbs
 
Steve Gibbs

The World Cup is well underway now - and from my vantage point in front of the television, the surfaces in Russia are looking spectacular.

 

It's interesting to note that six of the 12 stadium pitches being used in the tournament have been installed by an Irish-owned company SIS Pitches.

 

The pitches at the Luzhniki Stadium, Otkritie Arena, Rostov Arena, Kaliningrad Stadium, Samara Arena and Saransk Arena have all been created using the company's reinforced natural turf system, called SIS Grass. These are comprised of 95 per cent natural grass and five per cent synthetic fibres.

 

What this means is that the final on July 15th will be the first time a World Cup will have been decided on a pitch which is not comprised of all natural grass.

 

What is significant though, is that no pitches in the competition are 100% artificial. Why is this? Do FIFA feel there isn't the appetite yet amongst players and managers and fans to play their showpiece competition on fully synthetic surfaces?

 

If so, that does seem to make it doubly insulting to cast one's mind back a couple of years to the 2015 Women's World Cup in Canada where the world's elite female players were expected to play on such pitches - much to the dismay of many the participants. So vehement was the objection by some to playing their matches on artificial, a group of players led a human rights violation lawsuit based on gender discrimination. This was eventually dropped in January of 2015 ahead of the June tournament.

 

The controversy rose its head again this past week though when it was announced that a joint bid between Canada, USA and Mexico had won the right to host the 2026 World Cup. The U.S. lawyer who represented the coalition of female players in 2015, upon the announcement that the men's 2026 tournament would be played entirely on grass pitches, including the games in Canada, has demanded an apology for the female players.

 

The lawyer, Hampton Dellinger, said in a statement given to The Canadian Press "We are much closer in time to the plastic pitch debacle of 2015 than the grass tournament of 2026. And given the artificial turf the women were forced to play on and the threats made against those who protested, I believe Canadian, U.S., and Mexico soccer officials still owe female players an apology."

 

During that 2015 Women's World Cup it was reported that the pitches were heating up to incredible temperatures. According to Wikipedia, prior to the start of the Australia vs Japan quarter-final in Edmonton on 27 June 2015, Fox commentator Kyndra de St. Aubin measured the air temperature at 28 °C and the playing surface temperature at 66 °C! However, it wasn't deemed necessary to take cooling breaks because the air temperature was below 32 °C.

 

It does seem a weird case of double standards that in equivalent competitions, taking place in the same country, the men won't be expected to play any games on anything other than natural grass? It's almost as if FIFA are admitting it was a mistake to make the women play in such conditions isn't it? Or is that just me reading too much into it?

 

Last week in my reporting of the results of a survey of professional footballers in Scotland who had voted Hamilton Academical's artificial pitch as the worst in the country, I was accused by a reader of offering a "typical one-sided article" in favour of natural grass pitches. "Ask the future players from the Academies who train on synthetic day in day out," the reader proposed.

 

Which is an utterly fair opinion. Training on artificial pitches is rapidly becoming the norm, with youngsters knowing no different and having no objections to doing so. It just seems to me that for major flagship competitions natural turf, admittedly reinforced by a small percentage of synthetics, should continue to dominate.

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EDITOR'S BLOG
WORLD CUP WINNING SURFACES
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EMERGENCY AUTHORISATION GRANTED FOR SOIL PEST CONTROL PRODUCT
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HUSQVARNA STAFF RENOVATE DARLINGTON PARK
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