Field of Play Inspection

The phone has been going crazy this morning with DF ringing, the Secretary of Field, hosts of this afternoon's game and Emma (referee for this afternoon) advising of the game being called off because of 3-4 inches of snow and then Fat Lad telling me his game was also off after an inspection by a local referee. This means he can't come watch me in my Minor FA game next Saturday when we were due to be officiating games on adjoining pitches with different kick off times.

The final phone call came from DS who until recently was Secretary of Towngate, one of the Sunday league clubs in the local area who are still in the County Cup. He needed a field of play inspection. He tells me that they nearly played last week when the groundsman rolled the stadning water off the surface only for it to return 30 minutes later.

I took a ride over to their ground at Bradley Mills, Huddersfield. The pitch was covered with around 1-2 inches of snow but this was melting away. As I walked towards the water affected area I could see around 50 sq. yards of the field of play were covered by standing water. Even my own dainty (102Kg) footsteps were filling with water. When I reached the affected area I could see water up to 3 inches deep and across the top was a sheet of melting ice around 1 inch thick.

There was a bitterly cold wind blowing across the whole of the field of play and I felt sure that there was little prospect that this area would drain sufficiently for the game to proceed tomorrow morning at 11:00. I phoned the appointed match referee and advised him of my viewpoint. He accepted the advice and called the game off, leaving him to finish the paperwork and me to return home frozen to the marrow!