MCC Field closed for much needed upgrade

The MCC Grounds is closed, and it will remain closed for at least the next two months. Now the MCC is the only somewhat adequate football facility in the city, so you can imagine that the decision by the Sports Council has caused some concern. But the upgrade has been long delayed and the field does need some serious attention. Today, Mike Rudon was at the MCC where trucks are already dumping fill to get the process underway. Here’s that story.

Mike Rudon, Reporting

If you’re not a real aficionado of the sport…or if you’re looking at the field from a good distance away and maybe squinting a little…you’d probably think that the MCC football playing area is adequate and looks just fine. But it’s not. The ground is rock solid and far from level, with high areas and low-lying spots which hold water when it rains. It needs work, and that’s where the Sports Council comes in.

Patrick Henry, Acting National Sports Director

Patrick Henry

“What we’re doing we’re upgrading the playing field to a reasonable standard. As you noticed the landfill or the topsoil fill has been dumped already. There are markers down. The field will be raised to about two percent of the existing field right now. That will allow for a level playing field for the footballers who will be using this facility.”

Some people aren’t happy about the timing of the works because they have had to hold their competitions elsewhere. But it had to be done, and Henry says they bent over backward to accommodate until they couldn’t delay any longer.

Patrick Henry

“We did agree with the Premier League and the Football Federation of Belize that we will hold off until they were able to complete the ongoing competition at the time. In fact the weather affected the completion of the Primary School and Secondary School Football Competitions that were scheduled to be completed in November last year. Those were not completed until about February this year, and we again accommodated both the F.F.B. and the Premier League in their closing season. So it was time for us to move and to get the works done. We could not delay any longer. If we do not do any kind of works on the field, they will complain about us. So we’re doing works and they’re still complaining. It’s an unfortunate situation but the works must begin.”

Romel Berges

The first phase of the project should take a week to ten days, and is being done by RGB construction.

Romel Berges, RGB Construction

“The work right now is to elevate the football field to the existing level of where it’s low, roll it, spread it, scarify and roll it again…so that we have a cushion. If you realize it right now the football field is very solid. It’s like a thirty ton truck running on it and you don’t see a print on the football field. So after we finish the landscaping and with a two percent slope of the whole football field even…we’re coming with three inches of topsoil which means that from the existing level the football field will be elevated three inches now for drainage purposes so you won’t have water stagnant in one area and it rolls around the whole facility of the fence and it has a perfect drainage.”

As we said, that’s the first phase, but there’s a lot more planned for this facility which is a bastion of Belize City football.

Patrick Henry

“Apart from the existing playing field itself, because remember we will landscape this area, we will also be changing the lights at the MCC Grounds so we will be removing what we currently have here…these lampposts, I think there are about ten, twelve of them, and four towers will be constructed that will hold at least fifteen lights on each tower.”

The field is being upgraded in accordance with FIFA regulations. Mike Rudon for News Five.

It is expected that work at the MCC Grounds will be completed in eight to ten weeks.