How the changing climate impacts the beautiful game

Rain stops play, a saying usually associated with cricket, is now becoming increasingly linked with English football.

The change our climate is undergoing and has undergone over the past decade is directly resulting in more rainfall. As a result, football clubs have to go to great lengths to ensure that their games can still be played with postponed matches becoming an increasingly regular occurrence in the Non-League calendar.

This can have incredibly detrimental effects on a team’s season, with fixtures having to be rearranged at the back end of the campaign leading to extremely chaotic schedules and sometimes freak results.

The effect of climate change is being felt even more keenly at lower levels. This season the East Midlands Counties League have had to call off 34 games and counting as a result of the weather.

Their fixtures secretary David Holland says: “The last three to four years have got progressively worse.”

Notts County sit at the top end of the Non-League pyramid, with a pitch and stadium that are both fitting of a much higher standard. Their pitch is immaculately kept by Matthew Hallam, 31, and his team.

His passion for both football and grass are evident to see as he explains the finer details of being a groundsman in the modern day. He says: “If you go back 10 years this job was just about cutting grass but not anymore.”

As we walk over his beloved turf, he explains how they use lighting rigs that were once used for cannabis growing, to recreate the effect of photosynthesis. The lights were a gift from the police, he is keen to add.

Because of the level of facilities at his disposal, he does not face the same problems as groundsmen at lower levels. The Magpies spend around £5,000 throughout the season to keep the pitch looking pristine.

However, the changing climate is still having a major impact on the way in which Hallam prepares his pitch: “I’ve been looking after grass for 12 years and I have never known rainfall to the extent we have had in the last few months.”

Luckily for Hallam and Notts County, their drainage facilities have the ability to drain 147 millimetres of rain an hour. Hallam and his team believe this runs directly into the River Trent.

Nottingham Forest had to call off their home game against Reading on October 26 off as a result of week-long deluge. This was their first postponement caused by wet weather since December 20, 2003. Hallam says: “Our drainage is very good, probably better than over the river at Forest.”

Hallam studied for six years to gain the qualifications to be able to look after pitches to the level that a club of County’s stature expect.

He believes that: “another summer as dry as the last few, followed by wet autumns have been could leave a lot of smaller Non-League clubs in big trouble”.

He says: “If our climate continues to go the way it seems to be then it will affect the industry massively. With grass diseases becoming more of an issue if we continue to see more wet and warm winters.”

Hallam stops diseases effecting Meadow Lane by spreading fertiliser once a month over the pitch and spending 16 hours a week replacing divots.

You have to wonder how clubs that can’t afford to have three permanent groundsman and relay their pitch every season at a cost of £19,000 are going to cope if this climate trend continues.

There is no doubt in David Holland’s mind that the changes in our climate has caused this. Of the 34 games that have been called off he still has 15 to rearrange.

As I speak to him, he tells me he is just: “pencilling in 12 of these fixtures for the last two weekends in April”.

Holland has been doing this for 11 years in the East Midlands Counties League so is experienced when it comes to overcoming the challenges a Non-league fixtures secretary can face.

Radford FC play in the East Midlands Counties League and this is where I meet Tony Osbourne their Stadium Development Manager on a wet and cold Wednesday night.

As we speak about a ground he has had some involvement in for nearly 20 years, his beloved Radford are battling the conditions in a friendly fixture they end up losing 3-1 to Nottingham Forest U23s.

Osbourne proudly claims that: “Most other grounds would be off tonight.” But Selhurst Street has some of the best drainage of any ground at this level and Osbourne is keen to explain why.

He says: “There used to be terraced houses on this land. When they knocked them down to make room for the pitch, they left the cellars meaning all the rain-water flows directly into them.”

They did have a game called off on October 26, same day as Nottingham Forest, but when asked about this Osbourne tells an interesting tale.

He says: “The referee took that decision not any of our officials. In fact, our chairman was so confident the game would be on that he didn’t attend the morning pitch inspection.”

He goes on to speak about the Non-league structure in general saying: “There has definitely been an increase in the number of games that are being called off in the last few years because of what I like to call global wetting.”

Unfortunately for Non-League football especially at the lower level the situation that at Radford isn’t a familiar one.

As the rate of climate change increases there is definitely a fear that Non-league football will have to fight to stay in existence.

They are such an integral part of communities that they need to be given the help they need to make sure that the nation’s favourite game can still be played at every level.

By Alex Brinton