By Bruce Elliott, Head Groundsman

I've been employed by Reading now for three years, having previously worked at Tottenham Hotspur, Fulham and Millwall.

We have had a lot of fixtures played on the pitch in that time if you include the reserve games and the rugby games for London Irish as well!

The main problems we've had in the past have been drainage-related, so we had a new pitch put in during the summer. That work was done at great expense and I'm thankful for the Club's backing on that. Our new pitch is bedding in quite nicely now.

The first games to be played were Chelsea and Everton in the same week last month. At that stage the pitch was only six weeks old, which is probably the earliest you should play on a new pitch - even with the Desso System which we have.

So there was quite a bit of damage after that week, but it has got steadily better and it played much better for West Ham. And it will continue to get progressively better throughout the season.

The more we play on it the firmer it will get. We're in a break of games at the moment, but are approaching a period where the rugby starts joining our calendar.

So we now have Wigan on 22nd, followed by rugby on the 23rd and then the Carling Cup game against Liverpool a few days later - so it's about to get some use!

We're confident about the pitch this season though, we have 97% sand construction so there shouldn't be drainage issues. And we will have better grass coverage than in previous years - it should be a decent surface for the rest of the season.

Once we're into the height of the season we work from game to game. Our first job after a game is to brush the pitch. That removes all the dead grass out and cleans the surface on the top as well as replacing footprints.

Once we've done that it's a question of divoting. We can spend up to two days walking around the pitch repairing it. With the Desso System you don't get many divots but you do get scrape marks around the pitch.

The aim is to make it looking pristine so that it doesn't look like it's been played on. That gets more difficult as the season wears on and you get less grass coverage on the surface.

Once we've done the brushing we're then into the routine of mowing it again ahead of the next game. If we have a gap we fertilise and water heavily. With the sand-based construction we need to give it plenty of water.

If it is not moist it starts to fall apart. Watering is a priority once we get to the day before a game, it is done on the day and the night before.

Being in the Premier League has its pros and cons for a groundsman. Financially it helps - I'm not sure many Football League clubs would have done the work we did in the summer. But in the Premier League you are under more scrutiny.

Every game is televised - if not live then on Football First on Sky and on Match of the Day on the BBC. Comments are made by pundits about pitches all the time, so my work is under scrutiny. And all I can do is work hard to prepare the pitch to the best of my ability.

A lot of people ask how the rugby we have at Madejski Stadium affects our work. But generally, I don't think groundsmen who also have rugby on their pitch operate much differently.

The most important thing for me to remember is that we are a football club, first and foremost. Sometimes we'll leave the grass longer for rugby if we only have a rugby game coming up. But if there is both football and rugby on a double-header weekend then the pitch is cut for football and the rugby accept that.

So everything is geared for football and the only thing we do differently is marking the lines and changing the posts.

Sometimes managers dictate what is done with football pitches - the length of grass or amount of water - even the size of the pitch being changed from week to week. But from my point of view it's pleasing that Steve Coppell and the coaching staff at Reading are very happy with what I'm doing with the pitch at Madejski Stadium.

We've spoken about it and Steve's attitude is that he's happy for me to carry on as I'm doing and preparing the pitch in the same way. So we prepare it in the same manner no matter who we're playing.

On the other hand Alan Pardew was a manager who wanted pitches heavily watered - to the extent he wanted to see water splashing under their feet as they ran out. It's a personal preference and I'm lucky that every manager I've worked with has expressed their happiness with what I'm doing.

There is a lot of work to be done at the Hogwood Park training complex as well. The training pitch for the first team is called the 'Stadium Pitch' and it was built to the same contours as the pitch at Madejski Stadium. It has an eight inch fall from the centre of the pitch to the two sides and a two inch fall from the edge of the penalty area to the back of the goal and two corners. It is constructed like that to aid with drainage.

So with the pitch at the stadium being constructed that way, we wanted the same contours for when they train. And it's exactly the same dimensions in terms of size and markings - little things like that all help with training and coaching.

The lads work hard very hard at Hogwood to keep the pitches in good condition. It's a fairly big site, but we also get intense use there because of the Academy games - at some clubs they are played on separate sites. And the ground staff that work on the pitches here cope with it very well.

When we first opened Hogwood a few years ago there were a few problems with drainage, but we've done a lot of work over the last few seasons and I think we're starting to see the benefits of that work now. The pitches are staying in a very good condition over the winter months.

Another thing I often get asked about is for gardening tips. They think my garden must be pristine, but if they saw it they wouldn't ask anymore! It's full of weeds and holes where the rabbits have dug it up! My wife generally cuts it and tends to it - I don't have time.

She tends not to give me too much grief about it, and I'm fortunate for that! To be honest I have every intention to have a go, but never get around to it - like most people I suppose.

The last thing I want to do after a day cutting grass at the stadium is to come home to another lawnmower!