July 20,
2004
S-League CEO Chan King Fook has decided
to call off the Prime League match between Sengkang Marine & Home United,
scheduled to take place at 7.30pm yesterday after the pitch at Hougang was found unplayable as a result of overused over
the last few months.
The day before, 2 matches were already
played on the very same day with COE U18 match between Sengkang
Marine & Geylang United taking place at 3.00pm &
at 7.30pm, the Singapore Cup quarter-final, 2nd leg tie between Sinchi & Young Lions.
73 matches have been scheduled from 6
March to 19 September (7 months = 214 days), an average of a match in every 3
days & it could have been more if not for the fact some of the matches are
abandoned, postponed, or yet to release fixtures.
Originally Hougang Stadium is former S-League
club Sengkang Marine home ground & while the Dolphins sat out of this
season S-League due to financial reasons, the club are
still fielding teams in the Prime League, COE U18 & U16.
However after the tragic death of
Prime League boy Jiang Tao in March this year, Sinchi moved its home ground to Hougang,
but only for S-League & Singapore Cup matches. By then, fixtures for the
amateur NFL Divisions 1, 2 & 3 had already been released so there was no
choice but to squeeze all these matches at Hougang.
With an important match set to be
played tomorrow between Sinchi & Home United, the
S-league decided to the pitch should get a rest as it is feared the pitch would
not withstand another tough encounter so soon after Prime League match between Sengkang Marine & Home United.
Certainly one can hope with artificial
pitches set to debut in