Football News - Plastic Pitches

The Purist tackles FIFA's plastic panacea

What price must we pay to realise that contentious concept of continuous football? This is no reference to TV rights, nor does it refer to the cost of an hour split 20 ways weekly for the chance to run around and pretend you're a pro. Before, that is, you creak back to the showers grateful for that half a tub of whatever you'd applied to elbows and knees before kick-off.

No, it's the question inevitably raised by such Sepp Blatter pronouncements as this: "Integrating the artificial turf surface into the laws of the game is another milestone in the history of football. Millions of players around the world will benefit from this decision, as it will allow them to play their favourite sport on a more regular basis and, above all, in difficult climatic conditions that would make it impossible on natural turf pitches."

The mere act of tackling this issue invites the accusation of coming over all King Canute. Yet it is Mali and Tottenham goal-getter Fredi Kanoute that should out-worry any wheezing, hobbling hack, for although Tottenham missed out on UEFA Cup qualification and with it the possibility of a first competitive outing on plastic in 2005/06, Africa is well and truly on course to host qualifiers of the international variety on surfaces newly legitimised by Blatter's FIFA.

"An artificial turf system is defined as the top surface and any supporting layers that influence the sports performance or the biomechanical response of the surface."

There is more than mere anecdotal evidence from Canada, responsible for so much turf technology, and America, home of gridiron, that the possible long-term physiological effects put the superficial injuries of the amateur decisively in perspective. Still, with no axe to grind, and by no means in search of any hidden agenda, this increasingly occasional player and plastic pitch consumer tracked down some people who know what they are talking about.

ERDC is a contemporary leading patent-holder and manufacturer – of FIELDturf – whose spokesman in Scotland, David Brown, is insistent that it is memories he has to thank for his uphill PR battle now that modern surfaces make the experiments of English clubs between the 80s and 90s irrelevant.

Memories

Memories? "Get me a carpet, and paint it green", he points out, was the high-concept origin of the American business model imported to England, only to be banished after Preston North End's promotion party of May, 1994. "The first generation of pitches were not only carpets, but they were designed for American football," said Brown. Keep up, dear reader, as we are now onto the third generation, and though Brown's company supplies Hamilton Accies of the First Division, it's now over to the Scottish Premierleague's Dunfermline for their science bit:

"A new breed of ultra-smart, ultra-safe synthetic surfaces created with the very latest technologies to optimise footballing performance and offer impressive safety, community and commercial benefits, the new surface, called XL Turf, is specifically designed to maximise playing characteristics, absorption from impacts and ankle stability throughout play.

"It is guaranteed to be both softer and less abrasive than the previous artificial surface at Dunfermline and offers the Pars and their opponents increased grip and improved traction."

And if you liked the sound of that, check out FIFA's 119-page manual-cum-licence application form.

The fundamental reason Scotland featured – along with Russia (Luzniki stadium, shared by Moscow teams Torpedo and Spartak); the Netherlands (Heracles Almelo's De Polman stadium); Sweden's Orebro SK and Austria's SV Salzburg – in a UEFA experiment following draft pitch guidelines published in 2003, is inextricably linked to diversification in revenue. UEFA's Rene Eberle may have confirmed to the Purist that Turkey's Denizlispor have yet to lay their pitch at the Ataturk stadium, but that false start has added no time for stoppages to the debate.

Dunfermline ironically beat Aberdeen to the award of UEFA's grant of around 260,000 euro because the decision predated the switch from domestic jurisdiction to UEFA Cup clearance by a single season. The Dons actually feared a high enough finish would see them barred from representing Scotland precisely because they'd gone plastic! What is more, funnily enough, one argument advanced by the secretary of the SFA in an appeal for open minds on the subject in 2004/05 went: the best SPL teams should be grateful for the chance to prepare on synthetic surfaces. for when the possibility arose in away legs the following season!

There has been something of a fightback in Scotland, however. A close vote in March 2005 meant that Dunfermline having relaid their own 18-month-old assortment of green squares, had still to seek approval from the SPL's executive board at the end of the season in order to continue.

Hibs won 4-1 on Dunfermline's XL mark II debut neatly highlighting that the fact that Dunfermline and Hamilton have struggled in their respective leagues has muffled the kind of opposition they would surely encounter were they run-away leaders with unbeaten home records.

The mountain of heartfelt professional opinion available is easily employed to pre-judge the experiment's worth, and while that is not the intention of this column, some arguments nonetheless mock the proposition that the key to a successful artificial future lies in education. The progress of European clubs' youth academies tends to be cited regularly as an example of the adaptability of minds untouched by that first generation stigma.

They would say that

Glasgow Rangers manager Alex McLeish left no room for doubt when he entered the artificial fray, raising the spectre of lawsuits and complaining that even his ability to sign any of Europe's better players was endangered once they checked the fixture list.

He quoted Keith Armstrong, boss of Finland's HJK Helsinki on his club's conversion from grass: "He says that their players abhor it. Their physiotherapists' opinions are that it could take four years off a player's career. We don't like it full stop. I think it's significant that no footballers like it. Nor do technical staff like it.

"Earlier in the season when we told Jean-Alain Boumsong [about Dunfermline's pitch], he couldn't believe it. It could deter foreign players from coming here." McLeish is not speaking out of ignorance. his club can boast a FIELDturf training pitch, in common with several English Premiership clubs. "I know people say these pitches can enhance the community. Well, just build one for the community. Why make the professional elite league play on it?"

Brown is not shy about claiming the superiority of Hamilton's carpet over Dunfermline's, but does acknowledge a patronising side to all the community-centred rhetoric. While this goes some way to justifying McLeish's point, Brown's reply to the other charges was curt, for example: "The anecdotal medical evidence Mr. McLeish refers to comes from one club, HJK Helsinki, and is based on short experience and, if scientific in its nature, is taken over too short a period to be valid."

Wheeled out for Dunfermline's press conference on the eve of the Hibs game was physio Paul Atkinson: "All the talk of artificial surface causing injury is totally unfounded. UEFA has compiled a report comparing instances of injury at DAFC. For every 1,000 hours of playing or training on grass, there were 2.4 ligament injuries. There have been only 1.3 ligament injuries on the artificial pitch in the same time frame. Muscular injuries were 5.2 per 1,000 hours of usage on grass, but this has dropped to 1.9 per 1,000 hours on the XL surface.

"Out of six players injured for a significant period during the 2003/04 season, four sustained their injuries on grass, while only two were injured on an artificial surface. Our figures show that there is actually less risk of injury on the artificial surface."

The other side of the argument, which swiftly became one of Scottish football's hottest potatoes, ran: "I thought, ‘that is not a real game of football out there. The ball goes through and it runs away and there are three or four of my players complaining about sore backs and groins." that from one visiting SPL manager.

"It's horrendous" said another – let's call him Deep Throat – who, when pressed by the Purist, declared: "There's not only domestic federation politics involved but all the commerce hinging on its success. even the Sunday Herald mentioned the word ‘sweetener'."

And Deep Throat's response to the education argument? "I think it'll take at least a generation for there to be sufficient re-education, for it to be accepted by the players themselves, and I'm not so sure even that soon for international tournaments, given that such high-performance levels are crucial," he said.

So the laws have changed and everything.

Artificial turf was first used in international competition at the FIFA U-17 World Championship in Finland 2003, on a FIFA Recommended artificial surface.

The UEFA Executive Committee decided in Berlin on November 10, 2004 to accept artificial turf for its competitions as of the season 2005/06, simultaneously announcing a long-awaited harmonisation of quality standards with FIFA.

"Widespread approval from the teams and positive findings in terms of injuries proved that artificial turf is the best alternative to grass. The latest generation of artificial turf, especially designated for football, replicates most of the qualities of grass, and is fully acceptable at all levels of the game," vouchsafed UEFA chief executive Lars-Christer Olsson and FIFA rubber-stamped this stance the following March.

The decision will have its greatest impact on countries with severe winters where maintenance of natural grass was difficult, Olsson said, showing a taste for the omenous as well as the obvious. But isn't the danger of such a euphemism as ‘climate' letting in the lobbyists through the back door as much a concern as whether the Luzniki is playable at minus 20 degrees (once the snow is removed)?

Deep Throat informs us that, in Scotland, UEFA's pitch questionnaires are, tellingly, filled out with zeal rather than turned into paper airplanes. "The players will tell you: its something like 95% against! For the sake of their ankles, their knees, and so on.

"Though they may have artificial turf among their training facilities, English Premiership clubs won't ever go for them again competitively – where's the need on any non-economic basis?
"Football will always be a changing game and I've no fundamental problem with that, I'd just draw the line at artificial pitches for now," he added.

Culture

Back to England, then, and Ashley Grimes, who played for Luton Town when they joined QPR, Oldham and later Preston in that brave new world of 80s astroturf, observed: "Ours was a far better surface than QPR's but the ankles we used to twist!" Grimes could not help but flinch at the memory of his time as a plastic pariah.

And while the controversy north of the border has not stopped the likes of Torquay, Leeds and Gillingham all being linked with the all-weather pitch solution, Steve Williams, the English FA's national facilities manager, made it clear enough that it remains a longer-term, lower-level option.

Asked if the English ban, after 11 years, could be lifted to coincide with UEFA's rules for 2005/06, he said, in February 2005: "Should UEFA approve artificial grass pitches, we will have to review our own rules and do the same domestically – but it's unlikely for next season in FA competitions, and you can understand a certain amount of hesitation given the history."

Williams then emphasised that UEFA policy remains that the sanction of pitches is at the discretion of a club's own national federation, or FA, as Scottish nay-sayers have had to accept. He then confirmed something of a source of comfort for those with a fear that national officials may be targeted or compromised: "It will be test houses, not someone in my position, that makes such decisions. And the choice of actual pitch will remain up to the client."

With an on-message "the Academy lads have grown up with it," the impressive Williams went on to hint at ever bigger-name ‘clients' across Europe if not at home and expressed faith in a two-year UEFA medical committee study addressing quality issues and injury concerns.

Revenue over research?

That at least sounds all well and good, but will football really end up the winner here? Amateurs in supposed ‘outposts' as Scandinavia and Africa will plainly be among the winners along with a few pioneer Canadians carpet-sellers, and inevitably, certain ubiquitous football equipment manufacturers, but football as a whole?

The propaganda battle rages on, with triple-jumper extraordinaire Willie Banks fronting the turf crusade in Japan. Pele seems to be the chosen poster boy everywhere else, having already laid claim to the belief that his career goal tally could only have been enhanced had he not played on so much grass.

Times have indeed changed and, so long as all the objections aren't airbrushed away, there is too much at stake in the preservation of the game's own integrity to get carried away on this issue. Not to mention it being too late.

Medical safeguards and studies are all very well, but remember that Dunfermline fulfils all the criteria required and the players hate it. Essentially, an industry was in place well ahead of any chance for true, meaningful debate, and the players, be they well-remunerated or otherwise, will bear the brunt of the price, you can be sure of that. What a pity if the false economy scenario advanced by Alex McLeish were to be ignored for the sake of the profit imperative. then again, it'd hardly be the first time, would it?

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