Unofficial Halesowen Town FC Forum

As the Halesowen News have a large article on their back page about Causeway sharing with us still next season, hopefully there are plans to get a professional on the pitch in the close season.

We've seen how last year's mad rush in pre-season to get the pitch in shape has resulted in this year's pitch state (and to be fair all the volunteers have done a magnificent job with very limited knowledge on groundskeeping). Unfortunately this is one of those things that fits in the category 'You get what you pay for' or as it was under he-who-shall-not-be-named 'You get what you don't pay for' but it was a bloody fantastic pitch during 2007-2009!

So I guess the questions are:-

1) Is there any money available to do this with someone experienced in football pitches maintenance?
2) When will the pitch work start (as from memory wasn't it the start of July last year when the panic began)?

This is intended to be open questions and hopefully not turn into the usual bun fight between people. We know what happened last pre-season, so I ask now in enough time to hopefully stop that happening again. Or at least start the worrying earlier

I was of the understanding that we'd 'politely' asked Causeway to leave?

1) Is there any money available to do this with someone experienced in football pitches maintenance?

I guess there is. We didn't budget for this years cup runs and we've had increased income from gate money as well as increasing ticket prices by £2. So I'd be surprised if there wasn't. If there isn't I'd politely ask why not? Due to aforementioned reasons, only a question and assumption, don't bite.

2) When will the pitch work start (as from memory wasn't it the start of July last year when the panic began)?

I'd hope the answer would be 'last kick of the ball at our last home match.

I'd hope the answer would be 'last kick of the ball at our last home match.

There are probably a few local cup finals or charity matches to fit in before actual work can start, but I agree with the sentiment

And what's the situation with this new youth project we're joining? The write-up suggested that they'd be playing on the pitch too?

RaidenYeltz wrote:I was of the understanding that we'd 'politely' asked Causeway to leave?

Causeway have a 7 year lease, therefore it would cost HTFC a substantial amount of money for them to leave.

The ideal scenario I suppose would be only Causeway and Halesowen Town play on the pitch and our players don't train on it unless it is completely unavoidable.

Hopefully work on the pitch will start immediately after the last game of his season. HH is right to mention the volunteers, we worked bloody hard on the pitch last summer, and no doubt will again this year, hopefully though with the guidance of pitch experts. Again, no criticism meant of Ant who does a great job with the time and resources available to him.

piearce9 wrote:And what's the situation with this new youth project we're joining? The write-up suggested that they'd be playing on the pitch too?

My understanding of the Academy was there would only be 5 games a season, i may be wrong.

wednesburystokie wrote:

piearce9 wrote:And what's the situation with this new youth project we're joining? The write-up suggested that they'd be playing on the pitch too?

My understanding of the Academy was there would only be 5 games a season, i may be wrong.

Not sure how many games there will be, but unless the club have budgeted for them to train elsewhere (which is a bit silly as it will eat into the profits), then the academy will be training on the pitch 4 days a week... That was how it worked at Sutton and Romulus but it didn't matter to them with their fake grass :-/