Ground
Tilbury moved to Chadfields, a former greyhound racing venue, after World War II. Previously they had played next door at a venue known as the Orient Field, which was leased from a director of Leyton Orient, but moved out after he ruled that they could only continue using it if they became Orient's "feeder club", which they were unwilling to do. The club purchased the ground in 1949 with money raised from the sale of a player to Southend United.
Floodlights were erected in 1966, followed in 1970 by an unusual concrete stand in which spectators are located above the ground-floor dressing rooms and must look out on the action through a row of large windows. A second brick-built stand with two rows of wooden seats was added in the 1990s. The ground is also notable for a huge expanse of netting behind one goal, designed to catch balls which might otherwise fly out the ground, but placed in such a way that spectators have to look through it.
The largest attendance recorded at the ground was 5,500 for an FA Cup first round match against Gorleston in 1949, although in the modern era crowds are much more modest.
Read more about this topic: Tilbury F.C.
Famous quotes containing the word ground:
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—Willa Cather (1873–1947)
“Some people are like ants. Give them a warm day and a piece of ground and they start digging. There the similarity ends. Ants keep on digging. Most people don’t. They establish contact with the soil, absorb so much vernal vigor that they can’t stay in one place, and desert the fork or spade to see how the rhubarb is coming and whether the asparagus is yet in sight.”
—Hal Borland (1900–1978)