Sons' sorrow

[George Parr]

Notice the Huntley Colts match in the Scottish is off as well. We'll need a few things to come together to get a match on next week.

[pleslie99]

9 minutes ago, The Moonster said:

I assume the ref got up early.

Looking forward to more angry reactions from top blokes like Andrew Bennett and this Passionate numpty.

It was scheduled for 845am along with Inverness inspection. I was only wondering why 9am is earliest we are allowed? Not that it makes a difference, we all knew it was off about a week ago

[BallochSonsFan]

22 minutes ago, Diamond8 said:

I'm sure we are only due to play you at home once and have already moved a fixture. You'd probably prefer to play us at our place right enough.

 

If we could log in to our Pixellot account from your stadium and stream it like a Sons home game then I'd be all for it.

[the snudge]

Just now, BallochSonsFan said:

 

If we could log in to our Pixellot account from your stadium and stream it like a Sons home game then I'd be all for it.

Definitely. How hard would it actually be? Play it at Airdrie tomorrow as our home game. Common sense. Don't think there'd be too many objections

[Replays]

25 minutes ago, Jan Vojáček said:

Fair play to the boy tagging the Scotland National Team in his complaint. Hopefully big David Marshall pops along and sorts the park out.

 

I mean, if anyone could fix the pitch, I’m pretty sure it’d be David Marshall *swoons*.

[cameron2000]

Don’t see how there’s any chance of a game next week. Is likely to be even colder and it’s unlikely we’ll even have an opponent to play against

[Bring Back Paddy Flannery]

I've been slightly disappointed by some of our previous postponements but there's absolutely hee haw anyone could've done about today, the ground has been rock solid for about a week.

In terms of a plastic pitch... I'd be all for it if there was some way of funding it, I just can't see how we could afford such an investment at this point in time.  As much as I like that we play on grass, this season in particular it has become a bit of a pain in the arse. Out of interest did all other clubs in the lower leagues with plastic pitches fund it themselves or was there help from local councils etc?

[O'Kelly Isley III]

I've been slightly disappointed by some of our previous postponements but there's absolutely hee haw anyone could've done about today, the ground has been rock solid for about a week.
In terms of a plastic pitch... I'd be all for it if there was some way of funding it, I just can't see how we could afford such an investment at this point in time.  As much as I like that we play on grass, this season in particular it has become a bit of a pain in the arse. Out of interest did all other clubs in the lower leagues with plastic pitches fund it themselves or was there help from local councils etc?

Artificial pitches aren't infallible. Livi have one and their home fixture earlier this week was knocked out. And any talk of installing one is pure fantasy.
Anyway, we're not at crisis point and we were in much worse situations at Boghead. There may be no football in the coming week but after that things will likely begin to ease and fixtures can catch up.

[Dumbarton Rock]

I don't think it would be that easy to just lay a plastic pitch due to our subsidence. The pitch is still moving towards the river and the dip used to flatten out round about the first goalpost, it now carries on about 20ft by the goals. It would cost a 5 figure sum to level it before you could even start on it. Add in the fact you wont stop it continuing there could be a major problem. I'm no expert but you don't notice it with grass and I'd imagine the astro would just rip, it's not just an inch or two we are talking about.

[The Moonster]

7 minutes ago, Dumbarton Rock said:

I don't think it would be that easy to just lay a plastic pitch due to our subsidence. The pitch is still moving towards the river and the dip used to flatten out round about the first goalpost, it now carries on about 20ft by the goals. It would cost a 5 figure sum to level it before you could even start on it. Add in the fact you wont stop it continuing there could be a major problem. I'm no expert but you don't notice it with grass and I'd imagine the astro would just rip, it's not just an inch or two we are talking about.

We'll need to carry out that work regardless if we put a plastic pitch down. 

[Dumbarton Rock]

1 minute ago, The Moonster said:

We'll need to carry out that work regardless if we put a plastic pitch down. 

I appreciate that, it's the movement after the pitch is laid that I'd foresee mega problems. Probably be fine for a few years before you notice problems, but the pitch is still moving every year and new low spots are appearing. Most of these are where we have flooding problems.

 

[FifeSons]

Where’s global warming when you need it.

[FifeSons]

2 hours ago, Jan Vojáček said:

Fair play to the boy tagging the Scotland National Team in his complaint. Hopefully big David Marshall pops along and sorts the park out.

 

[Dumbarton Rock]

If this happens again it could be a long winter. In 2010 it was my m8 Kenny Watters that was doing the park with Elkie, I'm sure he said there wasn't a game for nearly 3 months.

[FifeSons]

We don’t have enough money to turn the floodlights on, let alone lay a plastic pitch! 

[airdrieman]

6 hours ago, the snudge said:

Should just play it at Airdrie tomorrow. Probably against some SPFL guidelines

 

6 hours ago, Jan Vojáček said:

Granted it's on Astro, but with no fans the ground really doesn't make a difference at the moment. I'd be more than happy for us to switch it to Airdrie again tbh. It's handier for most of our players too.

Looking at the forecast for the next week the weather doesn't look to go above three degrees at any point. Assuming that's correct, is there any chance of next week being on either? 

 

5 hours ago, the snudge said:

Definitely. How hard would it actually be? Play it at Airdrie tomorrow as our home game. Common sense. Don't think there'd be too many objections

I object on the grounds of our home form being abysmal for about a decade now - with or without fans. 

[Diamond10]

4 hours ago, O'Kelly Isley III said:

Artificial pitches aren't infallible. Livi have one and their home fixture earlier this week was knocked out. And any talk of installing one is pure fantasy.
Anyway, we're not at crisis point and we were in much worse situations at Boghead. There may be no football in the coming week but after that things will likely begin to ease and fixtures can catch up.

No problem with game getting called off today with temperatures being so low all week. Most seasons postponements aren’t much of an issue this year being the exception with teams risking themselves training for a game with little chance going ahead . Going forward though you obviously have problems with your pitch if you have games called off as regularly as you do and in all months of the year it does start to become a bit of a farce.  With temperatures to remain the same all week you could pretty much call off your game next week already. As for the artificial “livi” argument Dumbarton probably have had more games called off in the last week than livi in recent seasons so that’s a non starter. Airdrie used to have games called off due to water logging all the time and now we never do. We also use the stadium to train so don’t pay to train somewhere else and rent out the pitch during the week creating income so I don’t think it’s a pie in the sky project these thing generate their money back over time. 

[FifeSons]

1 hour ago, Diamond10 said:

I don’t think it’s a pie in the sky project these thing generate their money back over time. 

The problem is, you need to have that money in the first place. Which we do not.

[pleslie99]

3 hours ago, Diamond10 said:

No problem with game getting called off today with temperatures being so low all week. Most seasons postponements aren’t much of an issue this year being the exception with teams risking themselves training for a game with little chance going ahead . Going forward though you obviously have problems with your pitch if you have games called off as regularly as you do and in all months of the year it does start to become a bit of a farce.  With temperatures to remain the same all week you could pretty much call off your game next week already. As for the artificial “livi” argument Dumbarton probably have had more games called off in the last week than livi in recent seasons so that’s a non starter. Airdrie used to have games called off due to water logging all the time and now we never do. We also use the stadium to train so don’t pay to train somewhere else and rent out the pitch during the week creating income so I don’t think it’s a pie in the sky project these thing generate their money back over time. 

They may generate money long term but as the above said u need money now to get one. Also, read previous posts from our former groundsman (if he was still groundsman then the majority if games this season would've been on) and you will see with our pitch its a bit more complicated than simply laying a plastic carpet.

[Bring Back Paddy Flannery]

3 hours ago, FifeSons said:

The problem is, you need to have that money in the first place. Which we do not.

That’s where some form of community funding would help. We may well have already gone down that route and been unsuccessful in getting any funding but it’s certainly something I’ve never heard being mentioned in the past. A good quality plastic pitch could benefit more than just the club. 

I asked the question further up in the thread... but does anyone know if every other club who has one in the lower leagues funded it themselves? It seems like a hell of cost for some these clubs to fork out upfront so I can only assume some clubs had some sort of funding to help them out?

From the Championship down you have Alloa, Raith, Queen of the South, Airdrie, Falkirk, Clyde, Forfar, Montrose, East Fife, Cove, Stenny, Annan and Edinburgh City. There are also numerous plastic pitches in use below that level. If the likes of Annan can install one is it really such an unrealistic suggestion that we could also go down that route?