The plastic pitch question
Posted on | August 20, 2009 | No Comments
Plastic football pitches were very much a 1980s phenomenon, largely associated with short, sand-laced Astroturf which liked lying cunningly in wait for naked knees.
However, they seem to be going the way of synthesisers and gaudy women’s t-shirts in making something of a comeback – and this time they are here to stay.
Red Bull Salzburg played the first leg of their Champions’ League qualifier last night on an artificial surface at the Stadion Salzburg Wals-Siezenheim. They went down 2-0 to Israeli team Maccabi Haifa, but my attention was firmly fixed on the surface rather than the football.
This was not just because this game in particular was played on it, but because we could be seeing more and more ‘plastic fantastics’ in the years to come.
Are they here to stay?
UEFA now allow its competitions to be played on the surfaces provided they meet strict FIFA requirements – ie, a slide tackle doesn’t result in a skin graft and a masochistic TCP session. To be fair it really did look just like a well-laid grass surface, and appeared to play like one too.
But I’ve seen a similar pitch before in Leicestershire, UK, and played 90 minutes of my own distinctly non-Champions’ League standard of football on it.
Yes, the ball runs well, yes, there’s no unsightly bobbles to ruin your beautiful slide rule passing, and yes, my knees were not disfigured. But it just doesn’t feel quite right. It’s a bit like going to watch an Andrea Bocelli concert and later being told he mimed the whole thing – it seemed right, and you enjoyed yourself, but at the heart of it is an imitation, a deception, an accepted con.
Cows can’t eat it either
Where’s the smell of the grass? Where’s the smear of white paint on the centre half’s forehead? And whatever they say about how safe it is, there’s no way I’m trying out a knee-slide goal celebration on it.
At the end of the day I quite like the fact that grass isn’t a perfect surface – it adds an element of unpredictability and we all love that satisfying feeling when we see a groundsman has turned turf into a billiard-table surface with hours of love and attention.
Don’t get me wrong, I love anything which makes my short passing game look better. But I’m doing it my way, not with the help of a surface which would make cows sick if they tried to eat it. It’s just wrong.
Chris Breese
[Photo: Guttorm Raknes GNU]
Tags: artificial turf > astroturf > champions league > plastic football pitch > Red Bull Salzburg
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