A mix of expertise, community effort and maybe a few Child of Prague statues at the door; the fight to ensure pitches remain playable at this time of the year is an effort that's worth acknowledging.
The weekend’s league programme across football, men’s and women’s, and hurling – the camogie leagues are still a few weeks away – saw 46 out of 47 games staged with the Division 4 football clash between Waterford and Longford the sole faller.
A few late venue switches in there in the women’s programme, but overall an excellent outcome considering the heavy rainfall that swept the country in the days leading up to the action.
The skies aren’t clearing ahead of Round 2 with the country in the midst of a number of weather warnings as Storm Chandra makes hay. Across the country, preparations begin again, but’s it’s clear that better all-round facilities are resulting in less disruption.
It’s not all positive news though. A number of groundsmen who spoke to RTÉ Sport said that they are facing real problems as a result of the split-season while the trend in recent seasons of supporters entering a pitch en-masse after nearly every game is another sore point. A field suited for 30 players all of a sudden is overrun with hundreds – something that can cause real damage in the months before the summer hard ground sets in.
This week, with the rain sweeping across the country, groundsmen are on high alert to ensure another full programme of games is delivered.
It’s all change in Leitrim and Sean McGoldrick is happy with what he has been seeing.
Two games last weekend, two games this weekend, the recently re-laid surface at Heartland Credit Union Páirc Seán Mac Diarmada has certainly made life easier.
"Two years ago, with all the rain we’ve had and all the rain coming up, we wouldn’t have been able to have two games," said the Páirc Seán Mac Diarmada event controller.
"We would have been out grating the field and grating around the goal-mouth to try and get the water off the pitch.
"Now the rain doesn’t sit on it, it’s off it nearly as quickly as it lands on it."
That new pitch was open in time for last April’s 2025 Connacht SFC clash between Leitrim and Mayo, but since then it has been given time to breathe, much to McGoldrick’s delight.
"We’ve really looked after it for the last 12 months," he said.
"It has been used very sparingly, no underage finals, no double-headers or anything like that.
"It can get a bit tender so two games in two days doesn’t do it any big favours with this weather but we are where we are."
Sparse use has made way for constant action in the early stages of the various league seasons.
Last Saturday, it was the Lidl National League clash between Leitrim and Offaly – newcomer Kate Gormley continuing her good early season form with the crucial goal in the home side’s 1-11 to 1-08 win.
There was less joy for the hurlers on Sunday as they lost by three points to Longford and they’ll be hoping to make amends on Saturday against Sligo.
Just 23 hours later, Stevie Poacher’s football side welcome Waterford to the Connacht venue – and McGoldrick, Leitrim GAA administrator Brian Blake and Páirc Seán Mac Diarmada chairperson Michael Doherty will be making sure that the pitch – as well as the all areas of the ground – are in tip-top shape for those games.
One of the most meticulous groundsmen in the country is undoubtedly Armagh’s Ronan Hart. Protective of his cherished surface, you’d often get a sharp reminder if you’re standing somewhere you shouldn’t be.
It’s understandable when you consider the work that goes into pitch maintenance at the BOX-IT Athletic Grounds, now a real central hub at county, club and schools' level.
Back in December 2022, the Irish sporting calendar was all but wiped out one Sunday due to heavy frost – but there was one notable exception on the GAA scene as the Ulster club final between Derry’s Glen and Down’s Kilcoo went ahead.
One of the main reasons it passed the Sunday morning pitch inspection was that Hart and a helper went out and laid down approximately 500 square metres of blankets over the section of the pitch that can often miss the rays of the sun.
The RTÉ cameras are heading up to the Cathedral City for Armagh’s Division 1 game with Galway on Saturday and Hart will be hard at work, with a machine he and a friend adapted set to prove very helpful.
"The biggest problem is you can’t get machinery onto the pitches, it’s too wet.
"What I will do is I will inject compressed air into really poor areas that aren’t draining really well; I’ll just put a spike into the ground, I have a PTO compressor on a tractor that’s parked off the field and I’ll run long hoses to key areas.
"I’ll put the spike in the ground, pull the lever and it’ll lift three or four inches and drop down and it just blows the ground apart and immediately you’ll see the water draining through."
The Athletic Grounds was one of five inter-county stadiums recently selected by Croke Park to work with the company Raw Stadia for one year.
The Belgian business provides expertise on data collection around pitch states covering areas like soil moisture levels with the ultimate goal of helping to reduce injuries and optimize surface performance.
Halfway through the project, Hart said the information gleaned has opened his eyes to the possibilities of high pitch maintenance.
"There are two separate devices," Hart explained. "One is telling you about compaction and firmness and another device is like an artificial football boot that tests what depth the stud goes down. You turn it 90 degrees then and test the resistance and ultimately you feed all this data in and it tells you what football boot you should be wearing on any given day. It stops slipping and sliding and that, in turn, stops injuries.
"I have been using it this week for the firmness, picking 25 points and it’s a scientific way of telling you whether it’s playable or not, how close it is to being playable and what areas need treatment."
Tipperary GAA’s head groundsman Padhraic Greene has been eyeing up the rainfall level – 57mm from last Monday to Saturday, 14mm between Sunday and Monday.
The RTÉ cameras were present in Thurles last Saturday as the All-Ireland champions started their hurling league campaign with a win over Galway, with the footballers hosting Antrim on Sunday.
FBD Semple Stadium is an old stadium and with that charm comes the inevitable issues of old-style infrastructure.
"Presentation is one thing, playability is the main thing," is his take on his role.
"It’s an old stadium designed for the old game when the winters were off.
"It’s an unbelievable summer stadium, but there’s no drainage when the water table is up; it’s in the hands of the Gods at that stage.We have a machine to spike pitches, you’re keeping an eye on the weather but after that you’re just hoping.
"In the summer you’d aim to give the last cut maybe on matchday or as close too, the winter is different, especially with that rain.
"Before the match there at the weekend, Thursday was the one day to give little or no rain so I got the pitch marked."
After a big game, Greene, who sometimes has an apprentice assisting him, would be instantly back preparing the field, repairing divots with forks, brushing grass back and perhaps using a rotary mower.
On Monday, he arrived at the stadium with the aim of doing some repair work, but it was just too wet to even attempt it.
Greene believes the split-season of recent years is impacting the type of pitch that can be produced for the inter-county game, and he wonders is that good enough for the best players.
"I think the split-season is maybe opening eyes to the issue, because groundsmen are struggling.
"I have seven home games in football and hurling, minor Munster League, Under-20s then 19 April for the first Munster SHC game.
"You used to get down-time, a window between the end of the league and the start of the championship.
"That’s not there anymore and you have the elite of the elite expecting to be playing on surfaces to match that, are we giving them that?"
Sunday is another big day for the Ardee club as DEFY Pairc Mhuire hosts the Division 2 clash between Louth and Cork.
The Wee County has been the wet county in the lead up to it, but officials are confident that they’ll find a way to host it.
Mickey Rooney, a Louth SFC winner with the St Mary’s men in 1995, is back for another year as chairperson and stressed the community spirit that is in play to get the grounds in the right condition to welcome the Rebels.
"It really is a group effort and a lot of people will be there to help out," he said.
"There hasn’t been a game on the pitch in a few months, I think the (Louth) intermediate final was the last match and we’ve sanded it a few times since to try and get it ready.
"John McBride [JMB Sportsfield Services], who does a few pitches in Leinster, would help us out a lot and then we have some brilliant community employed workers and then members of our committee and from the club would always be there to help out too."
It was 46 out of 47 last week across the various national leagues. Storm Chandra will test those numbers again for Round 2 – but teams up and down the country will be doing their best to fend off the elements.
Watch Armagh v Galway in the Allianz Football League on Saturday from 4.30pm on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player. Follow a live blog on the RTÉ News App and on rte.ie/sport. Listen to Saturday Sport on RTÉ Radio 1
