Mitchell Backing Artificial Pitches

Last updated : 17 February 2012 By Bournemouth Co-Ordinator

With a new debate opening up relating to using artificial pitches in the Football League, Cherries Chairman Eddie Mitchell is backing the idea, being quoted in the Bournemouth Evening Echo as saying on the matter: "I think it would be a blessing in disguise for lower-league clubs and think we will see artificial pitches replace turf pitches in years to come. In my opinion, it is progress and the way forward. Technology has made them so good now that it would be such a big saving for everybody. I would like to think the two lower leagues would be unanimous in putting them down and that all clubs would have pretty much the same playing surface. It would have to be universal in the lower leagues to start with and there would have to be a lead-in time for it because I don’t think it would be cheap. In the long run though it would be one helluva saving for everybody. Artificial pitches would be a god-send for lower league and non-league clubs that don’t have in-house training facilities because it would provide somewhere to train every day".