Quite often the subject of teams playing on football spec FieldTurf comes up on these boards. Many posters think the game is adversly affected by the way the balls rolls further and faster than on natural grass or even soccer spec FieldTurf. With this in mind, I wonder if adidas could design a ball for use on FieldTurf which would provide more of it's own rolling resistance. Even if teams move away from synthetic surfaces for matches, many still use it for practice and having a ball that moves on FT like a normal ball does on grass would help in training.
You mean like a ball in between the current one and the fuzzy, heavy, low bounce Fustal ball? The trend in balls is to faster more aerodynamic to aid in scoring. I doubt any "special" ball that fights this trend would ever be adopted. But I do hope they remove the sanitary napkins from the ball as that makes the ball quite ugly; IMHO.
you know that's not a bad idea really. the only flaw is that it would probably affect the ball's flight on shots, long balls, etc. and probably less accurate. it would be great for the ground game but bad for the air game. when they design a ball that could change from a slower ground mode to a normal air mode, then it will be adopted. till then, players will just have to adjust.
Yes usasoccerhooligan, your thoughts on possible downsides to the idea are about the same as mine. Fan of Futbol, I'd forgotten about the five a side balls, I used to hate those things when we played midweek leagues as kids. I do think it would have to be some kind of surface coating or texture on the ball to add rolling resistance.