Keepers of all kinds, unite!

In recent years, the term "greenkeeper" has gained considerable popularity. The fine performances of our national golf heroes have not only boosted the sport. The people behind the scenes, especially greenkeeping, have also gained prominence. Originally, "the green" denoted the entire golf course, and thus the maintenance people became the "keepers of the green." Only later was the designation used only for the short-mowed area around the flag. Much less known to us (until today then) is the groundskeeper: the international name for people who maintain soccer and other grass sports fields. I myself have provided maintenance on both golf courses and soccer fields. So I can say with certainty that the two professions are so different that they warrant a separate name. And they deserve it, because the challenges are a lot greater today than they were twenty years ago. By the way, if you don't like all this English, you can still refer to it as "the groundsman", which is always correct.

But more important than what sets us apart is what connects us. And those are first and foremost our love and passion for our grass and our fields. So I love the fact that there is now a magazine that highlights our job. "Our" magazine, because many people already subscribed to the foreign trade magazines, but now we also have one in Belgium. It shows once again that interest is growing and professionalization is developing. A next step, one that has been in the air for a long time, is to unite the groundskeepers in a real professional association. There have already been quite a few commercial initiatives and recently from the sports associations. But if we are honest, surely this association should just come from within ourselves, the groundskeepers. After all, who knows better what our needs and requirements are? What training we need and how to organize it? And who better to defend our interests than ourselves?

While we're uniting, let's also suddenly merge greenkeepers and groundskeepers. Because not only can we learn a lot from each other, but we can learn together. There are a lot of overlapping topics in our professions. So we could organize a lot of training and information sessions together. With the Greenkeepers Association of Belgium (or GAB for short), we have had an association for and by greenkeepers, so specifically for golf, for over thirty years. But what is stopping us from copying this already proven recipe and bringing all grass sports together under the same umbrella? In the United Kingdom, soccer and rugby, two giant sports there, form one association together. So why shouldn't we in our little country join hands to form a strong bloc together? That way we can strengthen and expand the core functions of the GAB - bringing together, educating and supporting.

All we still need are people who want to do it. It doesn't matter on what sports grounds you exhibit your grass skills, in what league your club plays or what language you speak. If you like to organize things, have something to say about grass, or otherwise want to put your shoulders under our club, we need you. To conclude my speech, I can think of no better words than those of our national motto: Unity makes power! L'Union fait la force! Einigkeit macht stark!  

Michel Van Uffelen is a board member at the Greenkeepers Association of Belgium and development manager at Natural Grass, spending this summer as groundskeeper in Paris.

Michel Van Uffelen
Pitch Development Manager