by Mick the Ram

Violent storms brought abnormal levels of rainfall to large parts of England over the weekend and the intensity of the deluge has seen one football club find their pitch has developed a sink hole overnight, meaning no action will be possible for the foreseeable future.

AFC Wimbledon play in League Two of the English Football League (EFL), the country’s fourth tier of the professional game, but they had been due to play Premier League side Newcastle Unitedon Tuesday 24 September, in the Carabao Cup competition, in which teams from all four divisions compete.

That game was immediately cancelled and fans of the south-west London club began an online crowd funding page which was raising around £1,000 an hour in its opening 12 hours, to help with what is expected to be an expensive repair job.  

This comes a week after central Europe was also devastated by significant flooding, caused by Storm Boris, which left at least six countries under water, with areas along the Czech-Polish border among the worst-hit and many lives lost.

Huge disappointment for fans

Excited anticipation had gripped supporters of AFC Wimbledon ever since they were drawn against one of the richest sides in the land, for their third round Carabao Cup meeting.

The disappointment in the whole area was enormous when the news broke, although the amount of rain that fell possibly had people concerned about a postponement anyway, but for a waterlogged pitch… not a disappearing one!

Resembled bunkers on a golf course

The Cherry Red Records ground, as it is called for sponsorship reasons, was struggling to cope with the water levels, so may have been unable to stage the game, but the sight that greeted staff over the weekend resembled bunkers on a golf course, with one corner of the pitch opening up and stretching across to the penalty area.

A huge sinkhole had developed forcing the cancellation of the game which will now move north to be played in Newcastle instead.

Home for last four years

The south-west London ground has been home to the football club since November 2020 and is shared with rugby league side the London Broncos.

Wimbledon FC had played just 200 yards down the road until 1991, when that stadium was deemed unsuitable for conversion into a modern all-seater venue.

After just over a decade of playing at neighbouring grounds and amid huge controversy, the football club moved 70 miles north to the city of Milton Keynes and rebranded as MK Dons.

“Spiritual” home coming

Fans were naturally angered and upset and eventually a phoenix club under the official title of AFC Wimbledon was born, and they have done remarkably well to fight their way back through all the tiers of non-league and back into the professional standings.

Their aim was always to return to their “spiritual home” and so a new purpose-built ground was erected on the site of the Wimbledon Greyhound Stadium, literally a stones throw away from their original home.

There was nothing to suspect that there was anything unsafe regarding the surface on which the pitch was laid; though obviously there had to have been a weakness which the intense rainfall over a sustained period has fully exposed.

Community spirit at its best

Demonstrating what a proper community club AFC Wimbledon are, within minutes of the news breaking, fans realising the likely cost of repairs to the pitch, began raising funds to do their bit.

Graham Stacey, a former board member of the Dons Trust which owns the club, said: “That’s what we do in times of trouble, we come together. We don’t know yet what it is all going to cost and we don’t have a rich sugar daddy, which is why we rally round, because we own the club and it’s up to us: what we put in, we get out.”

Continuing he explained the depth of feeling for the club: “It took a lot to get this place built; they said we couldn’t do it and we did.

“We started at the bottom rung when we reformed and in nine years, we were back in the league. We see adversity, we face it and we get through it.”

Boris not to blame

The UK were well aware of the weather issues experienced in central Europe in the week leading up to the storms, but the weather over England during the weekend had nothing to do with Storm Boris, which left half-a-dozen countries in a terrible state.

Italy had been the last in line of countries battered by Storm Boris, after the Czech Republic and Poland – where prime minister Donald Tusk declared a month-long state of natural disaster – initially felt its full force.

Austria, Slovakia, Romania, and Hungary also suffered badly, with at least 21 deaths reported across the continent; but the storm over England was due more to a buckle in the jet stream, bringing extraordinary volumes of rainfall and ferocious thunderstorms.