There are around 44,000 football pitches in Germany. But many of them are outdated or in poor condition. This makes DFB President Bernd Neuendorf very worried. He has a clear demand.
How important a good surface is was only shown in Munich almost two weeks ago. Shortly before FC Bayern’s Bundesliga game against FC Augsburg, new turf was laid in the Allianz Arena. The NFL game between the Carolina Panthers and the New York Giants that had taken place shortly before had left its mark.
Laying the hybrid turf is said to have cost 200,000 euros. In that case, the NFL reportedly covered the costs. But it can be assumed that the record champions could have afforded it – like many other clubs in paid football. In complete contrast to those clubs in lower regions, where money is tight but worries are often great. Especially against the background of dilapidated places.
“We shouldn’t be in a worse position,” warns the DFB boss
Bernd Neuendorf, the President of the German Football Association (DFB), has now complained about the poor condition of many sports fields in Germany and called on politicians to invest more. “I am convinced that due to the poor infrastructure we are endangering the existence of many clubs,” said Neuendorf in an interview with the “Leipziger Volkszeitung”.
“We have a total of 44,000 football pitches in Germany. Many of them were built a very long time ago, but little has been done to upgrade the pitches, clubhouses and floodlight systems, let alone to renovate them in terms of energy efficiency,” Neuendorf continued. “One of our tasks is to continually convey this to politicians. A federal infrastructure program is one of our central demands.”
The long-time SPD politician Neuendorf was State Secretary in the Ministry for Family, Children, Youth, Culture and Sport in North Rhine-Westphalia from 2012 to 2017. At the federal political level, the 63-year-old also calls for “a Minister of State for Sports in the Chancellery, where all the threads relevant to sport come together. This has long been the case in culture. “We shouldn’t be in a worse position.”
dpa/LaGa
