DLF helps Azerbaijan host successful 2012 Women's under 17 World Cup
On the 12th October 2012, the FIFA Uunder 17 Women’s World Cup trophy was claimed by the French team after their penalty-shootout win over Korea DPR. The match took place at the Tofig Bahramov Stadium in Baku, Azerbaijan.
After hosting the Eurovision Song Contest the Azerbaijan authorities won the rights to host the 2012 Under 17 Women’s World Cup Finals - but to host the event they had to upgrade and build several new venues. The existing pitches were in bad shape, and indigenous sports turf skills were limited, so they looked to the UK for the solution. Tony Adams, ex England player, became involved and through him sportsturf specialist Phil Sharples. Phil’s job was to bring the pitches up to scratch in the extreme environment of the region, and one of the first things he did was seek out expert help from global breeder DLF.
“The event was to be the first major football tournament the country had ever held and it was very important to them to do a good job,” Phil pointed out, “It was a challenge, but one to look back upon with great pride.”
DLF were asked to supply a suitable Bermuda grass and recommend a suitable hard wearing poa pratensis mix to do the job. To put the task into perspective, the new turf gave rise to the first poa pratensis/ lolium perenne and Bermuda grass pitches properly grown in the country. Phil again, “We are used to working with a degree of historical data and soil and plant labs in the UK, but we had little comparable data for Azerbaijan and were faced with numerous stadium surfaces with differing extremes of heat and cold”. 
The chosen varieties, within the poa pratensis mix selected, had characteristics to enable them to cope well with drought and heat stress plus having the wear characteristics required for short burst of really
intensive play – helped by the inclusion of the No 1 rated sports turf cultivar Sombrero. The Bermuda grass, Mirage II, was selected for the main 8km Stadium in Baku; newly constructed for the Women’s Under 17 World Cup and became something of a sports turf test bed.
This new Stadium had a busy time during the World Cup, hosting 11 matches over 22 days, from qualifying matches to all the quarter and semi finals. “The Bermuda turf held up fantastically,” says Phil. “It was the busiest stadium in the entire tournament and was an impressive debut for the pitch. From a country with limited high level sports stadiums, to one capable of holding a World Cup, took a lot of hard work.
A similar UK version of the mixture including no1 rated sombrero ssmg is available to buy as Johnsons Sports Seeds JRR mix.
