Hybrid Pitch Brings New Life To Sporting Field

In a first for Sutherland Shire, Harrie Dening Football Centre at Kareela is trialling a new hybrid turf that will provide a consistent playing surface all year round.

The hybrid surface consists of synthetic grass that is stitched into natural turf and has proven to increase stability and deliver considerably more playing hours than traditional grass fields. This is especially important for high-traffic areas like goal mouths and cricket pitches.

Sutherland Shire Council is collaborating with Sutherland Shire Football Association to trial the hybrid grass system on one of the lower field goal areas.

Hybrid grass playing fields not only stay healthier for longer, they also hold less heat than full synthetic pitches. This means greater availability to the community, especially during the hot summer months. As an added bonus, maintenance costs of the hybrid fields are also significantly lower than full synthetic facilities.

Sutherland Shire Council Mayor, Councillor Carmelo Pesce said this new hybrid grass system would mean that more games could be played on the field, increasing the field use capacity without as much damage to the grass.

“Sport is such a strong part of our local identity and with increasing demand placed on our playing fields, Council is committed to supporting the continued use of our parks and reserves to meet the needs of our growing population,” Mayor Pesce said.

“We have already been working hard to help our playing fields stand up to the pressure by planting stronger types of grass, utilising better maintenance practices and installing irrigation systems and this new hybrid system should be incredibly beneficial.

“By bringing together synthetic and natural turf, sporting fields will be able to withstand considerably more playing hours each year and recovery time for the grass will be much faster,” Mayor Pesce added.

Sutherland Shire Football Association (SSFA) General Manager, Jeff Stewart said that the SSFA was extremely happy to work collaboratively with Council to trial this initiative.
“As the largest grassroots sporting association, with the highest per capita usage rate per field of any sport in the nation we know all too well how much time and effort is required to maintain the fields at an acceptable standard,” Mr Stewart said.

“We are thankful that Council has looked at viable alternatives to help manage and maintain the existing available green space and Harrie Dening Centre is an ideal location for this product to be trialled.”

Stephen Mallyon, General Manager of G5 Sports Turf, who installed the hybrid turf system, said it has been used across Europe on FIFA and World Rugby approved pitches and he was excited to bring the technology to the Sutherland Shire.

“We have installed SISGrass hybrid cricket pitches on wickets in Brisbane at the Bupa National Cricket Centre for Cricket Australia and QLD Cricket and Adelaide again for Cricket Australia and the South Australian Cricket Association, and also on playing fields at the Sydney Cricket Ground and Sydney University with great success,” Mr Mallyon said.

“SIS Grass has recently been endorsed by ICC, Cricket Australia and the International Hockey Federation and we congratulate Sutherland Shire Council for being the first Council in Australia to trial the system.”

Sutherland Shire Council will monitor the hours of usage and wear on the field with the vision of using hybrid grass systems on other playing fields in the future.

Staff Writer
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The serious waves Series Futsal have made and what it means for the sport

Football within Victoria in a broad sense is difficult to unpack from multiple angles. What is clear is the passion displayed by fanatics.

Although not a traditional form of football, it’s cousin futsal has slowly emerged as a popular indoor sport that has abundance of opportunity within Australia’s major futsal organisation, Futsal Oz.

Futsal Oz has been the manifestation of the football extraordinaire Peter Parthimos, who founded the entity in 2006. When discussing with Peter in regards to why he created Futsal Oz, he discussed how he wished to unify people, provide competitive competitions to those who played the sport, all the while providing opportunity to those who want to play on a leisurely level all the way to a professional level.

Despite having a turbulent tenure throughout the global pandemic in 2020. Futsal Oz came out of Covid-19 with a newly furbished Futsal court fit for its most talented players. The court resides in their Thomastown location. Series Futsal is currently the highest level of futsal across the country and features abundance of Australia’s most coveted football players.

Melbourne-owned Sport Recreational Wear manufacturer AKU is a proud partner, with many women’s and men’s series sides opting to use AKU as a kit sponsor. The company also designed and created kits which were featured in the monthly major event in Thomastown, combining the best players across the Series Futsal competition to represent their respective ethnicities. The event was broadcasted on FireTv, a subsidiary to American-Bulgarian Company TrillerTv, who specialise in combat and European Sport streaming. Melbourne born Commentator Michael Schiavello spearheaded the broadcast acting as executive producer.

Each Wednesday and Friday the competitions are streamed live via YouTube and its independently ran application “Wefroth”, allowing its humble yet passionate fanatics to watch each round of Series Futsal unfold.

Through the running of competitions and the opportunities it sets through broadcast, futsal is in a healthy position.

Feyenoord secure record shirt sponsorship deal with MediaMarkt

German electronics retailer MediaMarkt will become the new shirt sponsor of Dutch club Feyenoord for the 2024-25 season in a record multi-year deal.

The two parties have agreed a three-year deal – through to the conclusion of 2026-27 – believed to be worth around €20 million (AU$33.1 million) in total, according to Dutch outlet De Telegraaf.

The company will replace EuroParcs which has been featured on the front of the Eredivisie club shirts since 2021.

MediaMarkt is a German multinational chain of stores selling consumer electronics with over 1000 stores in ten countries in Europe. The company is one of the largest sellers of electronics in Europe with a total of nearly 2.1 million products sold in 2023.

MediaMarkt’s head office is in Rotterdam and the company became convinced of the collaboration after gaining insight into various data about Feyenoord that suggests large growth is imminent.

It became attractive for the company because Feyenoord has gained a greater reputation not only nationally, but also internationally through long, reasonably successful participations in the Conference League, the Europa League and also the group stages of the Champions League.

As a result of this on-field success, the MediaMarkt partnership would be the Dutch clubs most lucrative shirt sponsorship deal which follows on from a record kit supply deal signed by Feyenoord last year with Castore, a UK sportswear brand.

Feyenoord have been winning off the field as well, recording record net revenue numbers in two of the last four years, including the 2022/2023 season which amounted to €99 mil (AU$164.2 mil), a thirteen percent increase on the previous year.

In domestic shirt sales, they ranked third last season behind PSV and Ajax but are projected to overtake PSV in 2023/24 after their recent league success.

Feyenoord has a tradition of long-term contracts with main sponsors, MediaMarkt will only be the eighth big name on the shirt. More than half a century ago in 1982, the Gouden Gids was the first shirt sponsor.

This deal is proof of Feyenoord’s incredible growth on and off the pitch with their marketing and trophy successes. MediaMarkt hopes to grow further by investing in Feyenoord’s upward trajectory, located right near their main headquarters.

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