DRONE FOOTAGE: New Pitch Completed at Scarborough Sports Village

Work to repair and replace the football pitch at Scarborough Sports Village has been completed on time and under budget, allowing local teams to return home for the new season.

Work to repair damage and replace the football pitch at Scarborough Sports Village has been officially completed, meaning local clubs can finally return home.

The highly anticipated reopening follows a challenging period for teams including Scarborough Athletic and Scarborough Ladies, who were forced to play their fixtures away from the town last season, with Scarborough Athletic hosting their home games in Bridlington.

The project, overseen by North Yorkshire Council and carried out by contractors Willmott Dixon, was delivered on time and under budget, according to the council.

Drone Footage

North Yorkshire Council’s Executive Member for Culture, Arts and Housing, Councillor Simon Myers said:

" I'll tell you what, it's a dream come true. 12 months ago it was fraught with difficulties, fraught with cost, fraught with deadlines, and here we are today. Looks beautiful, delivered on time, under budget. That's something a councillor is really pleased to see. Scarborough Sports Village belongs to the community. It doesn't belong to councillors. I just hope everybody will rally round now and get back playing on this pitch. Support the Athletic club, support the ladies, get their kids out here playing over the summer. That's what we're here for".

Scarborough Athletic Chairman Trevor Bull said:

 "It's far superior to the last pitch. It's far superior to even when the first pitch was laid back in 2017, so really delighted with it. It's going to be very closely monitored. Everyone Active here have been challenged to keep it absolutely right. But they've got the equipment to do it, and it should be ok".

Will Watts from Scarborough Ladies says the club are very excited to return home:

" We've got 120 girls desperate to get back onto a better-than-4G pitch now, isn't it? So really desperate to get back on the All Weather. We've been scattered around for the last season. It's been a bit of a nightmare keeping track of everyone. But yeah, coming back, bring the girls home. Can't wait to get 'em back on it. It's just been challenging, logistics, keeping track of everybody. And when you're a club, you want all your players in one place and we haven't been able to do that. So it'd be really nice to see all those girls from five to eighteen in the same venue at the same time doing their thing, enjoying their football, and that's what it's all about"

Ed Pearson, Commercial Manager for Wilmott Dixon, said:

" We obviously worked with the council very closely early on to identify what the cause of the issue was, and then very, very quickly established what we needed to do to get it back into its sort of full use. And from that point onwards, it's been pretty seamless I would suggest. The main thing we were worried about, if I'm honest with you, was the weather. So very early on, because we started earlier in the year when it was a lot colder, the one thing we thought could prove a challenge is we had a protracted period of poor weather.  But as it turned out, we didn't have any of that at all. So it went exactly as we an- anticipated, and finished a little bit earlier than we expected to as well. The council made it pretty clear early on how important it was to the community, and that was something that we were really focused on. And I have to say this is the first time I've seen it completed, and it looks magnificent. Looks absolutely superb. So hopefully it'll stay like that for many years to come as well.

Scarborough Athletic Manager Jono Greening said:

" Like everybody, I've seen obviously the pictures on social media, but it's great to come down today. It looks absolutely unbelievable. I think my first reaction was it looked like Wembley when I first walked out. But I think it's absolutely incredible. Obviously it's been a difficult year playing no home games here for a year. I think the players have missed it, even though they were incredible last year in terms of the performances. We're playing, like, probably fifty-one games away from home. But it's great to be back, great to be back at the stadium, great to see the pitch. The goals are just getting fixed now, so hopefully by the end of the day it'll be looking like a normal football pitch again.