According to one of todays papers both Old Trafford at 107 metres goal line to goal line and Anfield 101 metres from goal line to goal line which major rugby league matches are played have been played on a pitch that is not correct! I think rugby league is the only major sport that is played on short pitches e.g. Cas is a postage stamp of a pitch and I think Widnes play on a 90 metre try line to try line

Can Mr Frisk stay with you guys on a season long loan?

Widnes is full size

Goal line to goal line in football is longer. Than try line to try line. A proper football field is between 100-109 long and 68-72 m wide RL FIeld 100m pluc 6m ingoal either end. Similar width although a lot of older grounds like Cas are much narrower and Odsal barely 90m

Nfl feilds 100 yards (92m) x 52 yards (48m) plus 10 yard endzone

Well spotted, it took a search party ages to track down Luke Gale amidst the rolling plains of old traff. I now know why.

All previous Grand Finals should therefore be replayed on a correctly sized pitch

As far as I'm aware, Bellevue has the largest playing area.

It's certainly 100m but I think it's width is more than the average. Also astonishingly flat for such an old ground, maybe not perfect as in modern stadia but pretty close.

KCOM was shortened a few years ago, I think it's only 96m and this is very noticeable at the 40-30m marks thus a 40-20 kick isn't a full 40m on shortened pitches.
The pitch is supposedly 114x76yds for the soccer.

I dont mind them varying a little bit. It means teams have to be a little adaptable and be able to alter their style. Make the most of the the big pitches by shipping it early and be able to play a quicker more forward dominated game on the postage stamps to open up the space.

Maybe but, it certainly gives clubs like Cas a huge advantage at home and it's no coincidence that they are up at the top of the 40/20 (or should we say 35/20) charts.
As I said, a huge advantage.

As for Old Trafford, the in goal and steep slope at each end are far from ideal for RL but the venue, in terms of size and proximity to "The Heartlands" means that it will get the gig every time.

Nobody seemed to care about our pitch size when we are getting thrashed on it week in week out. We are near the top of the 40/20 charts as we have a decent 7. WheldonRoad isn't anything new for opposition players.

Also add on that there are two teams on the pitch. It's not an advantage because the other team has the same size field to play on. If anything, it makes our ability to play with attack better on larger pitches.

When we lose, it isn't down to pitch size. It's usually down to quality of opposition - same for other teams.

Of course it's an advantage.

Over the season Luke Gale has 13 matches to kick 40/20's on the small pitch, Danny Brough, for example, has one match to do the same.

It's an advantage if all Luke Gale wants to do is top the 40/20 charts. In any game at Wheldon Road it's just as easy for opposition half backs to kick 40/20s.

I disagree
It's easier to kick a 35/20 than a 40/20 and if you play 13 games a year on a "toy" pitch then there is a definite advantage.
You could of course argue that it because Gale plays most games on the smaller pitch, that, it will be more difficult when Cas play elsewhere and perhaps it is and there is no doubt that Gale is an excellent kicker.

It would be interesting to see the split on how many 40/20 he kicks at home, compared with games played on "full size" pitches.

Because they play on a tiny pitch Cas will probably kick more 40/20s then everyone else. They will also probably have the most 40/20s kicked against them. It balances out.

No it doesnt' its like the slope at mount pleasant, the home team know how to play the pitch better than the opposition, it's called a home advantage, other pitches have characteristics that the home team play to their own advantage, like the corners of the dead ball area at odsall the rubber granules being loaded in certain areas at wildness and so on.
Visiting teams to the jungle won't have that in their strategic play as much as cas have it in theirs.
All that said, I have no issue with the size of a pitch as long as it's in the legal limits set by the governing body and no issue with any home team taking advantage of their own pitches characteristics

If there would be any advantage in a small pitch, it would be for those clubs that play grunt rugby, five drives and a kick, as five drives takes you nearer to the tryline at Wheldon Road than at Wigan. Ironically, of course, Cas have done well by playing the width of the pitch, not the length.

The shorter pitch for 40/20's is only an advantage if you always kick from bang on the 40 metre line, which doesn't happen. Perhaps knowledge that the kicks might be easier to achieve is a psychological advantage, but the grass at Wheldon Road doesn't make the ball bounce differently, which is usually the reason for failed 40/20's.

Funny that when we were awful and a bottom of the table team it was never mentioned. But now are a top 4 club. Everyone mentions the pitch size. Yaaaaawn.

We were a top 4 club last year, doesn't follow we'll be one this year though.

To be fair, haven't the RFL rules shrunk the Wheldon Road pitch to the point where it is now more noticeable, due to the required distance from dead ball line to fence (it doesn't seem to matter that a leaping player at Old Trafford can suffer a long drop if his trajectory takes him over the dead ball line)?

For anyone arguing the toss about Cas's pitch size too, ours is 92m (the minimum guidelines). Only 8m shorter than the ideal 100m, but is exactly the same width as everyone else.

So essentially 4m in each half, which amounts to 8m in goal areas (which is what the RFL guidelines state).

100m x 68m with 8m in-goals and 3m run offs down the touchlines.


So it's actually a 36/16.

Not going off 1 season. We have finished top 4 2f last 4 seasons. 5th in the other 2. We are a top 4/5 team now.

No it's not, Wakey's pitch is wider and by area is the biggest in SL.