Campey Turf Care Systems in association with their Cambridgeshire dealer, Scamblers, held a successful demonstration day at Clare College, Cambridge, to show what the Koro® FIELD TOPMAKER can do on a cricket square.
The Koro® was originally used to strip the organic matter off of football pitches and has gone on to be used in rugby, golf and tennis with cricket becoming the latest adopter of the technology.
Cambridge United use the Clare College site for training and because of this head groundsman, Robbie Nightingale knows the difference removing the organic matter can make to a football pitch and was keen to test it out on his cricket square.
“There is a lot of good quality cricket played in the county and there is an opening for a few Colleges or clubs to pitch in together to get a Koro® FTM®,” he explained. “Using the machine in different sports to what it was originally used for is something that’s a growing trend and you read and see a lot about people using it, so we thought we’d have a look and see what it’s about.
“Because it’s a demonstration day and the first time we used the machine we wanted to start at 3mm and go down very gradually so we could take out whatever we wanted to. Going to 3mm is ideal for us because we wouldn’t have been able to do that with the machinery that we have so it’s been a fantastic opportunity for us, and others, to see it on our own square.
30 turf professionals from 28 different cricket clubs, football clubs and colleges from the Cambridgeshire region attended the event which also included a demonstration of the Air2G2 GT Air Inject.
Campey product specialist, Simon Holland, ran the practical side of the event and has seen an increased number of cricket groundsmen enquire about using the Koro® FTM® on their squares.
“Koroing has become more popular within cricket at all levels of the game,” he said. “I’m going to Edgbaston Cricket Ground to Koro a wicket there that has SIS Grass reinforcement, so that’ll be an interesting project to work on because it’ll be the first time it’s been done on a cricket pitch that’s reinforced.
“But although today is mainly cricket we do have people from other sports attending because they want to see the Koro® FTM® working. I think there’s a growing interest from the cricket side because it isn’t something they’ve adopted fully yet, but they can see the benefits of using it.
“The idea is to level the pitch, particularly the saddles, and pull 90% of the organic matter out so they’ve got a blank canvass to work with.”
