Fleetwood Town have teamed up with specialist ground care suppliers Campey Turf Care Systems ahead of the start of the new season.
By Tom BestwickFleetwood Town have teamed up with specialist ground care suppliers Campey Turf Care Systems ahead of the start of the new season.
Campey came to the Fylde Coast for a demo day at Highbury Stadium to demonstrate a range of their equipment that is now available to Fleetwood’s ground staff to keep the pitch in as good a shape as possible over the course of the season.
After a gruelling winter, Fleetwood’s priority was to install a new drainage system during the off season ground renovation that would give the club more of a chance of surviving the harsh weather conditions this time around.
Dale Frith, the Fleetwood Town Head Groundsman, was approached by Campey about the use of their equipment and he, along with 90 guests, were in attendance on Thursday May 23 for the demo day as Campey demonstrated their different practices that will help keep Fleetwood’s pitch in good condition.
Frith said: “A normal renovation will go through a contractor who will do all the work for us, this year is different with Campey’s because they approached us because they wanted to run a demo day somewhere in the north west. They knew that we were growing as a club and potentially would be after some equipment, so they come and run the demo day and do the renovation for us, and in return, we bought some additional equipment.
“It started on Wednesday when we stripped the top off the pitch and on Thursday we invited 90 guests and they demonstrated the different machinery and the different practises they do in order to produce the best surface possible.
“Through out the year the agreement with Campey is that they will lend us some equipment throughout the year as and when we need it. At the end of next season we will probably go out to tender again on the works as we always do.
“The Campey’s thing was something a bit different because of the work and to get the new equipment in. This year we still have a contractor who did some extra drainage work. This is also supplied by Campey Turf Care so it all worked in quite nicely for them and it was used as part of the demonstration.”
Frith believes that the new equipment will be hugely beneficial to Fleetwood over the course of the season, and the Head Groundsman says Fleetwood will benefit with the new drainage system, and with the new equipment, Frith will be able maintain a good playing surface for the players.
“It will hopefully help keep the surface as good as possible, and the top draining will help the drainage out. A lot of the problems we have had this previous season has been drainage related and obviously the weather was a big impacting factor on that, but if the drainage had been able to cope with it better than it had it could have been a better situation.
“It was mainly the improving on the drainage that was the key priority for us. We will use the machinery that we were able to get from Campey to maintain the grass colour, keep the surface open and maybe put some extra seed into it.”
With Town’s continuing growth, Frith is looking forward to a long partnership with the ground care specialists.
“Hopefully it will be a long partnership. The future developments of the club give us a possibility to purchase further equipment. It was good from my point of view that we are hosting a company like Campey’s; it puts us on the maps as such.”
