Cricket Club Groundsman's Trials and Tribulations: From the East To the West

After my visit to Bradford Park Avenue on Tuesday, Wednesday I was delivering in Airedale and ended up at Skipton Castle so the view couldn't have been more English as opposed to the Mosque in Bradford.

The gatehouse from inside the grounds with its Motto "Desormais" -Henceforth- The Royalist held out for three years against the Parliamentary siege and finally surrendered in 1645.

My friend, colleague and IOG Director David Robinson spiking the front lawn.

I must compliment him on the condition they are in they get trampled on Summer and Winter yet whenever I visit they look good.

It is a real pleasure to visit such a place -and call it work.

Thanks for the brew David.

Wednesday after putting the water on saw me delivering at Yeadon C. C.

Yeadon looking good in the Sun. The outfield is very soft and in need of drainage as a result it looks very brown and impoverished but I must say and compliment Andy the groundsman the square had a good cover of grass and looked well.

It was then off an my regular trip to Pool To Rake/brush out a pitch for a week on Saturday.

The pitch when I had done my bit over to Clive now to roll and look after it till the game.

Can you see the Fairy Rings on the left hand side of the pitch?

Think we will leave them be they are very difficult to treat and are not doing any damage.

"The Pool Mafia" well Clive he should have been at Headingley watching Joe Root and Jonny Bairstow hitting it miles but his ticket was for the day before.

Life is never straight forward is it Clive?

A spot of setting the cutters required -mind your fingers!

After returning to base to move the water I was off again to Pudsey St Lawrence where we are still having a problem getting grass cover.

Nets up all over the place at Lawrence.

Last weekends used pitch.

Areas that need to be watered and reseeded -for the fourth time since last season. Then they need to be kept moist to get germination which we should with the soil temperatures now up. The problem will be keeping it moist at all times without some one constantly on site and a heavy fixture list.

If you look carefully you can see the line where some of the seed has taken.

It been a hard slog this last 7 months especially on Surrey loam.

They are looking at having the square relaid at the end of the season I hope they use some more manageable loam.

Then it was Back to Kirkstall to take the water off and check the visibility of the new electronic number.

One of our members Paul is fitting a new electronic score box and he is having a problem with the visibility of the numbers so he has designed a new system which is much better but will take a week or two yet to get it sorted.