Football-Stad Linite receives artificial turf |06 January 2007

After a short delay in the start of work, two employees of Netherlands-based company GreenFields Sports Turf Systems, the licensee for the project, started installing the synthetic football astro-turf Friday January 5.

The installation work is expected to be over by January 15, in time for the triangular tournament to be organised by the Seychelles Football Federation (SFF) to help First Division League champions Anse Réunion and Land Marine Cup winners St Michel adjust themselves and get acquainted to the new playing surface before hosting their opponents in next season’s African Champions League and African Confederations Cup respectively.

The country’s national team, minus the Anse Réunion and St Michel players, will also participate in the triangular tournament.

Preparation work for the re-surfacing of the Stad Linite pitch was undertaken by Vijay Construction at a cost of R600,000, less than half the price asked by two other construction companies.

It is the Seychelles government who paid Vijay Construction the R600,000 for the sub-base preparatory work, while the funding for the artificial turf has come from Fifa.

In fact, Fifa’s financial contribution of US $600,000 will go towards the laying of artificial turf on two pitches here – at Stad Linite and at the new stadium being constructed at Amitié, on Praslin.

The playing surface of the 12,000-seater Stad Linite, which was built in the early 1990s and hosted its first match in 1993 when the country organised the Fourth Indian Ocean Islands Games (IOIG), will measure 105 metres long and 68 metres wide.

Designed specifically to mirror the playing characteristics of professional football, the 2-star latest generation of artificial turf, which is of a high quality, is likely to become the norm in the next decade as it has been approved by Fifa for international competitions.

G. G.