New pitch will allow Pilgrims to make better us of stadium

THE new hybrid pitch at Home Park will not only provide a better playing surface for Wayne Rooney's Plymouth Argyle players, it will also allow more women's team matches to be played at the stadium.

- CHRIS ERRINGTON

The pitch is designed to be more durable and while it will still require maintenance at the end of every season the renovation programme will be shorter and take less money.

Work on it only started after a Take That concert at the stadium in early June but there is now a good covering of grass.

The operation of the Argyle Women's team was taken over by the Championship club itself at the start of July, rather than the Argyle Community Trust previously, which is a significant step forward in its development.

Without a home ground of their own last season, the women's team had to play most of their games at the Devon County FA's Coach Road headquarters in Newton Abbot, and also at the Manadon Sports and Community Hub. They did play a couple of their matches at Home Park, though, with a crowd of more than 2,000 for their FA Women's Cup first round tie against Ilminster Town Ladies.

Argyle Women are set to have a new pitch at the Brickfields site in Devonport once it is converted into a new academy for the Championship club, but in the meantime they are set to play a number of their fixtures at the Theatre of Greens.

It is one of the many advantages that Argyle stand to gain from extensive work which has been carried out on the pitch over the summer break.

Argyle head of venue Christian Kent told Herald Sport: "It's a full reconstruction which means it is not only the grass and fibre sand that changes. Underneath we make changes to the irrigation. We have added more irrigation to give it better coverage.