Monday, December 15, 2008

DreamField Players

It's about the players, stupid.
The joy and magic of football arrives when you have children playing regardless of the field.
At a recent event in Hout Bay (Cape Town) the kids were playing on a surface that was more like beach football but dreams were made.

Wednesday, December 10, 2008

DreamField No Players

This is not Ireland but Gauteng, South Africa.
An emerald green football field but no players? There are many great fields like this but no one is playing. Our challenge is to bring back the magic!

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

DreamFields Graham

As a child growing up in Johannesburg we used to have football games at the "field". When we said meet you at the "field" everybody understood.
On a recent trip I took a photograph of the "field" and the "goals" which were the electricity power station. At that time there were no trees. Many happy hours of "three and in" and the rest were enjoyed by all the young boys in the 'hood. So boys need fields not necessarily stadiums to experience the magic of the beautiful game!

Monday, December 8, 2008

Dreamfields Gopane

Our two new football fields in Gopane Village have been completed and were played on by the schools in their first week.
A number of locals return to the village for the festive season break and a tournament has already been planned for before Christmas.

Thursday, November 20, 2008

Dreamfields and Paths

Pedestrian footpaths are evident on virtually all the football fields we see in villages.
Our soil fields have fences to keep out the cattle and goats but pedestrians continue to have their shortcuts with minimal impact on the playing surface.

Dreamfields and Rivers

South Africa is a dry country. There is one unique feature on most informal soccer fields that I will share with you tomorrow.
However the Imizamo Yethu field in Hout Bay, Cape Town, has a river running thru....

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Dreamfields in Villages

This is a typical football field in the villages across South Africa. Our passion is to give the children access to a level field where the ball bounces consistently, they can have fun and build skills to take them to the level of their dreams.

Monday, November 17, 2008

Cape Town's Field with a View

One of our dreamers, Craig, has the vision of converting some old tennis courts next to this beautiful field into artificial seven-a-side fields for the children of the inner-city of Cape Town.
Green Point eat your heart out!

Friday, November 14, 2008

Grass to Soil

Grass fields can quickly turn into soil fields in Africa. The high temperatures, lack of rain and maintenance can turn a green grass football field into a soil field in a few months.
Having spoken to a contractor who has build grass fields over the past 15 years his estimate is that 40% of grass fields will ultimately become soil fields.

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Richards Bay Keep it Green






Obie Oberholzer from Keep it Green is the prime contractor for our first grass DreamField in Richards Bay.



We are waiting for the municipality to provide water and electricity at the site before we can commence construction.



We are hoping for this in the next week!

Wednesday, November 12, 2008

Tshisahulu DreamField Drainage

We have 2 DreamFields at Tshisahulu which is 8 km's from Thohoyando in Limpopo province.
In October we installed drainage around the fields in anticipation of the rainy season. We also used soil-saver on the left of the photograph to plant grass and secure the banks.
Now that we have had really good rains we look forward to the grass growing and the drains draining!

Tuesday, November 11, 2008

DreamFields and Microsoft Project


An old friend came to visit.
We have new fields at Driekoppies in Mpumalanga and Richards Bay in KwaZulu-Natal in the pipeline.
We have just received the latest version of Microsoft Project that will enable us to plan and monitor the construction of these fields much more closely. It has been a few years since I last used this software and I am looking forward to the new features in the 2007 version.

DreamFields and Rain

Rain is important for soil stabilised football fields as it is for grass. The good news is that we had rain on our soil fields at Tshisahulu in Limpopo and our new fields under construction in Gopane in the North West.
We need rain during construction so that we can compact the soil to get a durable base.
Once constructed the rain activates the stabiliser to rebond the sand and provide a more compact surface again.
Thanks to Weather SA for enabling us to track the rainfall online!

Friday, November 7, 2008

Hardware for Soil Fields





Above are some items of machinery we use to prepare the soil fields before we do the laser levelling.




Thursday, November 6, 2008

DreamFields in Villages


All our football fields so far have been built on tribal land. Above are the offices of the Gopane Tribal Authority The top photograph is of Chief Janjo Gopane (extreme left), his 2 assistants and Danny from the local organising committee. They have made all of us extremely welcome!



Wednesday, November 5, 2008

Gopane DreamFields Emerging

We are "under construction" with our 2 fields in Gopane Village.

From the photo you can see the fields in 3 stages. On left is the soil having being riiped by the grader. The soil is then wet to aid in the compaction. To the right is the roller used for stage 1 compaction. On the extreme right the surface is being "shined" to get a level playing surface to be ready for many boots and feet.

Tuesday, November 4, 2008

Gopane Fields Local Organising Committee


Each DreamField we build has a LOC (local organising committee) to ensure that the community welcomes the new arrival.

In Gopane we have Danny as the head of the committee. Included in the photograph are representatives of the sports clubs, government, municipality, tribal authority, community workers and local business.

Monday, November 3, 2008

Gopane DreamFields Turftek


Len Ludick from Turftek is our field builder at Gopane. Turftek is the prime contractor for these fields.
We are busy constructing 2 soil football fields in the village of Gopane and tomorrow I will be driving from Johannesburg to Gopane via Zeerust, about a 3 hour drive.
Watch tomorrow for the latest update.










Friday, October 31, 2008

University of Cape Town Field

This new artificial football field has been constructed at the Universityof Cape Town.

Sure the class of '09 will have lots of fun. Certainly artificial fields look great!

Thursday, October 30, 2008

Gugulethu Fields




NY49 is well known by sports lovers in Gugulethu, Cape Town. Football, cricket, athletics all share this large sports complex.


The good news is that the buildings that had been vandalised have now been fixed and the fields are busy with people playing football and cricket.


While Dreamfields is not involved in any field building activities we did do a DreamBag handover to the under 10 team of Lucky Stars FC.


Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Green Point Stadium


Green Point Stadium is taking shape. My apartment in Mouille Point is a few hundred meters from the new stadium. I have a view of the sea and another landmark, Robben Island.
There are 2 apartments on each level. One had a view of the golf course and mountain and the other a view of the sea. This is a picture I took of the stadium from the apartment on the same level which now has a stadium view with the table top now on the stadium!

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Richards Bay DreamField


Hi from Richards Bay and potentially our first grass field. Norman Nxumalo is pictured on the current field.


The field is next to Lizwi High School and the community needs a decent field.

BHP Billiton SA (Aluminium) is the kind contributor to this dream.

Hout Bay Dreams


The Hout Bay Football community have a dream of a decent field where the residents can play.
The current field is a start but we can do better.
We are planning a tournament in December where the kids in Hout Bay can have a day to remember....

Thursday, October 23, 2008

Fields and Stadiums





On friday last week was in Gopane (50kms) from Zeerust and about 30 kms from the Botswana border.



We are building 2 football fields for the local community led by Danny. We will start construction of the fields on 3 November 2008.



One of the fields is being build from funds provided by Old Mutual and the other from a group of contributors.



On Tuesday had the opportunity to visit the Green Point Stadium (under construction). The exciting part is that the roof is being installed (top right of picture).


Where I was standing is less than 400 meters from my "nest" in Mouille Point where I go to sleep at night.



So football is the beautiful game whether on a field or in a stadium and the World Cup excitement is just starting.