DFL honours Pitch of the Year awards!

The DFL Deutsche Fußball Liga has again honoured six clubs for outstanding pitch quality this year. The “Pitch of the Year” awards for the 2022-23 season go to Bundesliga club Bayer 04 Leverkusen for its playing surface at the ‘BayArena’ and to FC St. Pauli from Bundesliga 2 for the turf at ‘Millerntor-Stadion’. This means the award for the Bundesliga is on its way to Leverkusen for the second year in succession.

The full list of the award-winning Bundesliga and Bundesliga 2 clubs for the 2022-23 season is as follows:

Bundesliga

• Bayer 04 Leverkusen – ‘BayArena’
• VfL Wolfsburg – ‘Volkswagen Arena’
• Borussia Dortmund – ‘SIGNAL IDUNA PARK’

Bundesliga 2

• FC St. Pauli – ‘Millerntor-Stadion’
• Holstein Kiel – ‘Holstein-Stadion’
• DSC Arminia Bielefeld – ‘SchücoArena’

The selection was made by an expert jury of three members of the DFL Expert Commission tasked with safeguarding playing field quality in Bundesliga and Bundesliga 2 stadiums, who also belong to the German Turfgrass Society (DRG e.V.). The awards and certificates will be presented to the winners at the greenkeepers’ information meeting in Leverkusen, which is scheduled for September.

Standards for pitch condition and properties are constantly rising. The “Pitch of the Year” award has been presented since 2013-14 to promote the quality concept for stadium pitches.

About the evaluation system

Evaluation for the award is based on three blocks: the “sporting criteria”, the “jury review of measured data” at the stadium, and the seasonal measured data from the in-house testing of stadium greenkeeping. The “sporting criteria” are geared towards the grading by the team captains of the participating clubs and the respective referees, who submit their verdict on the state of the pitch after Bundesliga and Bundesliga 2 matches.