The Peacocks are scheduled to take a break from their League programme when they host Paulton Rovers in the Quarter Final of the Southern League Challenge Cup tomorrow evening (11th January), ko 7.45pm.
The tie against Rovers who lie in 6th place in Division One South gives Town the opportunity of making the Semi-Final for the first time in their history, however the match is in severe doubt due to the wet weather of the past few days. Chairman Kevin Sturmey commented:” The pitch is still saturated after five days of rain since Thursday and some of it very heavy. It’s going to need at least 48 hours to dry out, so I have arranged an early inspection for 8.45am tomorrow. Unless we get 25 degree heat and 50 mph winds unfortunately the pitch won’t dry enough in the next 24 hours! I have booked a verti-drain for Wednesday morning and I am hopeful it will be dry enough for that to happen as that will help hugely and with dry weather forecast from Wednesday this should mean Saturday and next Tuesday’s games can go ahead with no issues. Having spent six hours on the quadraplay on Wednesday on the only dry day last week and with Rob, Richard, and Ben all divoting over three days, the pitch is getting better after the Tiverton match as the pitch was very soft for that game and even softer now!
Three games in eight days in January was always going to be tough but with recent rain it has given us no chance to do any work. Until we get some decent dry weather, we cannot get the pitch playable, it’s a shame but in this country, we will never beat the weather and we now get biblical amounts of rain which makes the job of a Groundsman even harder. We have a great team of Groundsmen here but sometimes nothing we do can make a difference and sometimes we all have to let nature take its course and be patient. I’m crossing my fingers that it will be dry enough to get the verti-drain on the pitch on Wednesday morning.”
The result of the inspection will be posted on our usual channels as soon as possible.