Here we are. Offseason 2003 and we will be watching the Fire play on Nexturf again at NCC and the Burn play at a high school stadium on the supposedly superior version of grasstroturf known as FieldTurf. We have no idea how many years will pass before the first shovel hits the dirt in Frisco, TX or Harrison, NJ. The grass field at East Rutherford has been SO BAD that the addition of FieldTurf seems both inevitable and even preferable there. Will the parties involved in East Rutherford save money with the use of fieldturf compared to the maintenance of a natural grass field? MLS has a possible expansion city in Seattle that has a new stadium with FIFA-approved Fieldturf. A possible expansion city in Oklahoma City/Edmond has a stadium that would be shared in Sept/Oct/Nov with 3 high schools and a small college. They had such huge problems this year with the grass field at Wantland Stadium that the local papers referred to field turf as a preferable option. And remember that MLS will extend through Sept and Oct this year. How torn up will NFL grass fields in Denver, Foxboro, KC, Chicago, and NJ be for this year's playoffs???... then add San Jose State football and high school games at the Crew's field to the mix??? Lockhart's gem of a field was a mess for Saturday's US/Canada game. I know everyone here (self included) would rather have soccer specific stadiums with grass fields that didn't have to share dates with NFL, college and/or high school games. But that ISN'T happening now and with the extension of the season through Sept/Oct, the problems will be getting worse, not better. Would having good, sturdy FIFA-certified fieldturf pitches actually be preferable to the muddy, divet-filled natural grass fields we'll see even more of next fall? <obligatory NASL reference> Contrary to what many soccer fans wish was true, the world famous, star-studded New York Cosmos could draw over 40,000 per game playing on astroturf back in the day. And I can tell you that no matter how bad fieldturf and nexturf turn out to be, they cannot compare to the rugburn, turf toes and assorted funny ball skips and bounces that were the rule on astroturf. After all, they still play indoor soccer on artificial surfaces, don't they? Discuss.
I play on an indoor field that has FieldTurf, the same as on the new Seattle Seahawk field. To me, this surface is far superior to many "grass" fields. It is soft, you can slide with getting raspberries, and it plays with much the same pace as the real stuff. I like it. If it comes to having FieldTurf versus the worn out bumpy fields that we often see, I vote for the phony stuff...
I've played on FieldTurf, too and thought is was fantastic. Way better than even some of the better grass I've played on. Only hassle is that the rubber "dirt" fills your shoes after a while.
yeah, I played on astroturf a long time ago and never played indoors. The problem with the Nexturf in Naperville seems to be that the field gets too hot because of the rubber stuff all over the field... supposedly, the FieldTurf at Southlake has a mixture of sand and rubber making it not as hot?... hmmmm... if I'm at the beach in 100-degree heat I'm thinking the sand alone is gonna be pretty darn hot... let alone SAND AND RUBBER?!? add the Metrostars to the mix and 30% of the games in MLS next season will be played on an artificial surface... none of these surfaces have been approved by FIFA (yet). Is the artificial surface argument still a reason for MLS to deny a franchise in Seattle? Especially since THAT field HAS been approved by FIFA. And I bet their surface is cooler this summer than the Burn's grasstroturf. Ironic that both the Fire and the Burn will likely have the hottest playing surfaces in MLS this year, don'tcha think?... Sounds a little hypocritical if you ask me. Maybe instead of tiptoe-ing around the issue, Garber & Co. should finally come around to the opinion that the use of modern artificial surfaces should not be used to automatically disqualify cities from getting a team -- if FIFA approves it, MLS should too.
i have to chime in... i play on an indoor field that is the fieldturf and the stuff is great. it honesty feels like the real stuff, and the only draw back is the rubber dirt...the crap gets in your shoes and after running around for 90 minutes your feet are almost rubbed raw... other than that i dont see the problem with using the stuff, it acts and feels like the real thing. ps. i believe fieldturf has been approved by fifa. i could be wrong but i remember an article about it being approved...perhaps i am wrong though, i dont feel like looking it up <laziness factor>
Checked out the new field at Dragon Stadium in Southlake, TX (new home of the Burn) and was not impressed by the way it looked or felt. The blades seemed too short and the field was hard. I had heard that this is the football setup and the soccer setup has shorter blades of fake grass but that doesn't seem possible. It is certainly possible that a quick walk by yours truly is not representative of how a professional will play on it. The season will tell that and looks may be much better from a distance and especially at night if they can hide the lines and end zones. How does any feel about this stuff taking over in Europe after seeing Chelsea's abomination? Other teams there are also having trouble with the new taller stands not letting the grass grow as much as it should. I seem to remember another terrible field in Italy last year or the year before. Solid dirt, yuck.
ever heard of white sand? head out to White Sands National Park in New Mexico or to the Gulf of Mexico... walk around on the hottest day of the year in your bare feet... it's nice and cool, you won't be hopping around because of the heat (2 side comments about White Sands National Park... 3rd or 4th landing site for the Shuttle and on a night with a full moon, it's incredibly bright because of the sand) moral: know what the exact material is that's being put in there, and how it will work with everything else
As jmeissen0 has pointed, it all depends on the sand. And I believe that Hitman (who lives in Dallas and who plays rec soccer) has played on FieldTurf on a hot day and has reported that it was not a substantially hotter surface than grass.
3rddegree.net has an interview with a FieldTurf rep who claims that because of FieldTurf's sand and rubber base their product will only increase the surface temperature by, "Six to ten degrees, where as the other rubber only products can get 15 to 20 degrees hotter." Gill admits that any artificial surface will, "Get hotter than grass", but that their system minimizes that issue." http://www.3rddegree.net/comment/burning/index.htm
The grass at the Cotton Bowl during soccer season has always been kept incredibly short. The couple of times I was down on the field, it was like a putting green down there, the blades were so short. I could see why it was a popular field amongst MLS players. So I can imagine that FieldTurf's soccer setup would have short blade. Unlike your average BigSoccer poster, I'm willing to give them a chance covering everything. If they don't do a good job, fine, I'll rip them. But until then, I'll reserve judgement and I urge everyone else to do so as well. The Amsterdam Arena, home of Ajax, is another notorious "bad grass" field. My personal point of view is that it won't be as good as the best grass fields in the league on their best days, but it also won't be as bad as the worst grass fields on their worst days.
The stadium lease says that if MLS awards a franchise, Seahawks Stadium must be converted to natural grass unless the league is using artificial turf in one of its other stadiums. To their credit, league spokesmen have said that the turf wouldn't be the reason to deny us a franchise. But MLS is flouting the USSF Division 1 regulation requiring all stadiums to be natural grass by 1998; by rule, the league should be demoted to Division 2 (for more than just that reg, BTW). What's hypocritical is the league's saying "build it and we will come" before the 1997 stadium referendum, then backing out in 2000 from lack of local investment despite earlier stating it would not be an obstacle, and then having Anschutz accumulate a bunch of orphaned teams without moving one of them here. Phil can withstand losses in Seattle just as well as in other cities. (rant over)
I too have played on FieldTurf. It isn't bad at all certainly much improved over the older synthetics. Also in the wet northwest it will be much easier to keep decent then real grass.
Dead on. Northeastern's field is on my street, and I often went over in the pre-snow seasons to kick around. Aside from a perfect grass field, I'd take the FieldTurf. It plays much, much better than old astroturf. Rain doesn't seem to affect the ball skipping too much, and obviously you don't have to worry about the pitch being ripped up. The little chunks do get in your shoes, but it never really bothered me while playing (just a pain in the ass to shake out afterwards.) I'd move for AC Milan to use the stuff right now. As much as I love the San Siro, that pitch is just horrendous.
It paints a bleak picture of future MLS fields. Fieldturf may be nice - but it is just making the best of bad situation. In my view I would rather the game be played on grass. Even poor grass fields like Chelseas last week or Giants stadium. I don't like the sanitized, perfect artificial surface. If the grass field becomes a factor in the play - well then it is a factor for both teams. When a guy makes a slide tackle, he should come up with a grass or dirt stain not a carpet burn or jock full of rubber pellets. When it rains, the field should become muddy and uniforms should get dirty. I hate watching NFL games in domes or artificial turf where the uniforms look as clean at the end of the game as they did in the beginning. Grass and the elements add an air of unpredictability to the game and make it even more interesting to watch. Fake grass reduces that for me. MLS may not have had many options, but the focus should ALWAYS be grass fields. God forbid this stuff catches on and pro soccer teams use it across the world. If I wanted perfect playing conditions I would watch golf or tennis or baseball where they close up shop in the rain. I mean how frigging hard is to grow frigging grass? I have grass growing in my cement damn driveway.
EXACTLY!!!! Call me a purist, but NATURE PLAYS A FACTOR IN SOCCER! FieldTurf is ok for SHORT TERM. But this isn't friggin pansy ball, we need real grass and not fake $hit! We might as well dome all our stadiums and paint the field if we're gonna put fake grass in. Jeez people, don't agree with their make-shift crap.
I caught over the weekend the tail end of a Sky Sports segment on this issue. In essence, the problem is that, as stadia get bigger, the grass gets less sunlight per day and air circulation is decreased (i.e., bigger, taller stands block out the sun and decrease airflow). This doesn't kill grass, but it does keep the root system from developing fully. Which means that it just can't hold up to repeated, hard use. Grass needs sun, period. Obviously, some places, like Foxboro, get around these issues. Foxboro (old and new stadia) has, as I understand it, a sand-based layer below the grass that allows for (1) root systems to fully develop (as I understand it, a grass plant takes two years to mature at which point it has a root system that's several inches in length - the blades might gets crushed by two NFL teams, but the deep roots are okay and can regerenate the blades quickly) and (2) good drainage. The grass doesn't look as lush and green as it might, but it's far healthier and resilient because it puts it's energy into root, and not blade, growth. Columbus has a beautiful field, too. I suspect that the small-ish stands help. But I expect the grounds crew know their business, too. The Sky piece mentoned Sunderland's Stadium of "Light" with its computer-controlled, rolling system of grow-light banks. The short grass in Dallas (Cotton Bowl) might just have something to do with the warm weather grasses that can be grown in TX (I'm just guessing here). Here in central NC, you can grow either cold or warm varieties: warm ones tend to spread (i.e., don't stand upright) and need to be mowed short; cold varieties stand more upright (but aren't as heat/drought resistent as the warm varieties). You can tel that I'm a homeowner who's been trying to establish grass in his shaded backyard for several years, can't you?
While I agree with you in theory, the practice just would not hold up in E. Rutherford. You have 2 NFL teams, an MLS team. International frendlies and a slew of high school, college and even the NYPD - FDNY football games. That is too much wear for any stadum to endure. If you were able to see the final match at GS last year against DC, you would have noticed that there was approx. 20' of brown dirt on each wing, created by the NFL sidelines. The play was terrible. Noone wanted to play in the dirt so the entire game was up the middle. 90 minutes of logjam. If this is the future in GS, I would much prefer FieldTurf and be able to play a full field game as opposed to a horrible dirt/tray grass mix. However, when we move to Harrison (oh please please please) there better be some natural grass there.
"Would having good, sturdy FIFA-certified fieldturf pitches actually be preferable to the muddy, divet-filled natural grass fields we'll see even more of next fall?" Absolutely and without question
I've been to a few Boston Breakers games in the last two years, and it's really not obvious from the stands that it's Field Turf and not grass. The bounce of the ball looks very natural, and the players don't have that cautious appearance that you see in a game on plastic or even in the Fire games that I've seen on TV.
I've played on FieldTurf or its competitors at six fields over the past two years. Each field played a little differently. And when the sun is out, the field heats up, at least it does at Nickerson. My observiations: The ball plays a little differently than grass, but you get used to it. It's also harder to chip the ball. I ended up needing to drive with my instep rather than chip a few times because I couldn't dig into the turf surface the way I can with grass. It's also harder to bend the ball on turf, which affects re-starts around the box especially. And like most turf surfaces, it gives an advantage to faster players. Bottom line, though, it's much better than a field that forces players to take a moment to get their touch under control because of bad field conditions. So if you want to see flowing soccer, and the choice is between a bad grass field--like the Meadowlands-- and FieldTurf, the turf is the way to go. If you have a bad first touch on FieldTurf, it's definitely your fault. I also think it will continue to improve over time, as the more recent installations are much softer than the older ones.
That's what I hope we see in Dallas. At least I can pretend its grass. Giants Stadium may be an exception - 2 NFL teams might as well be a rotor tiller on the field. Or they could hire Minnman to be groundskeeper - he seems to know his stuff. A couple years ago before the start of the MLS season, I was down at Fair Park for something or other. Walking past the Cotton Bowl, the stadium was closed but I went up to the chain link fence and looked thru the concourse down to the field. It was 50 degrees, clear blue skies and the Cotton Bowl field was as green as green can be. It looked as smooth as a still pond. I got a small chill and I could not wait for the season to start. You don't get that wistfulness with the fake stuff. I can live with football lines - but damn fake grass is depressing. The mystique of a stadium begins and ends with the field. No one gives a rats ass about the Astrodome but you better not touch Lambeau. The NFL has created its own mystique of a game played in the elements. Who doesn't love watching a game in a downpour or snowstorm on grass. It makes every play exciting. There may be little choice in Giants stadium but the priority has to be grass - not just the easier or cheap decision of turf. It has been nice to see some of the NFL teams move to grass in their new stadiums - Pittsburgh, Cincy, Houston. It would be a shame to see MLS move into stadiums with the fake stuff.
Originally posted by jmeissen0 ever heard of white sand? ummm... yes. head out to White Sands National Park in New Mexico or to the Gulf of Mexico... walk around on the hottest day of the year in your bare feet... it's nice and cool, you won't be hopping around because of the heat No fieldturf examples I've found on the internet specifically mention "white sand." EVERY link I've found just mentions "sand" and then tells us the rubber is made from ground-up Nike shoes... the only exception was the fieldturf advertised for golf courses which mentions it as "silica sand"... moral: know what the exact material is that's being put in there, and how it will work with everything else which may explain one of the reasons why FIFA will not certify a brand of surface like fieldturf, astroplay, etc... until they test the fields individually and certify them individually since there seem to be different football, soccer and golf versions of this stuff... To clarify a little, Northside, I'd hate to see anything but grass in LA and Columbus... and Rochester along with any other SSS that may be built. But I'd rather see FIFA certified fieldturf in Edmond/OKC because a grass field there is just asking for trouble just as bad as GS in Sept/Oct... it'll be interesting to see how many bad pitches/football lines we'll be watching next fall. As far as the Cotton Bowl is concerned, I smell a rat... I just don't see why you'd leave what is arguably the best field in MLS with rent of only $15,000 per game, a field that is rarely used, and suddenly go to a "temporary" high school site and spend the bucks to build up seating cap. from 7K to 12 or 13K... "economics"??? As for Seattle, is it really worth the big bucks it's gonna take to replace the fieldturf with grass (trays, I assume)? Do that for a few years and I'd think you'd have spent enough $$$ to build your own friggin' stadium! Anyhows-- do we know what flavor of sand is used for the base at Southlake?
Jog my memory, someone Who said, "If a cow won't eat it, I ain't playin' on it." Or words to that effect? It has to go back at least to the original Astrodome. Maybe it was Stengel. Anyway: I despise all these plastic fields. They *do* peel your skin off when you slide. They *do* heat up like a furnace in the summer sun. Ugh.
Except that regardless of who the I/O is in Seattle, it's Paul Allen who has agreed to pay for it. He's also agreed (I believe) to make it a permanent transistion, not grass over the top of FieldTurf, but pulling the turf out and putting grass dwon for the Seahawks and MLS. Of course, as soon as this is announced (If it ever is, I doubt it), we'll get the sports parents complaining that due to the wear and tear on grass the high school/rec league/etc. playoffs and finals are being kicked out of the stadium, and that's not fair!