The NFL is coming to the Allianz Arena on Sunday, and Bayern Munich might want to have a groundskeeping crew standing by with fire extinguishers, shovels, and a small miracle.
The Detroit Lions and New England Patriots will take over the stadium for their NFL matchup, and apparently, the playing surface is about to have a very expensive weekend. According to Bild (via @iMiaSanMia), the NFL will cover up to €200,000 in costs for a replacement pitch after the game. That is a rather generous way of saying
that everyone involved knows the grass is probably going to get absolutely destroyed.
The good news is that Bayern Munich will not have to spend weeks playing on what resembles a badly maintained public park. A brand-new hybrid pitch will be installed in time for the Bundesliga clash against Köln next Friday. The bad news is that the Allianz Arena will essentially become a construction site between Sunday and Friday, with the grounds crew facing a rather ambitious deadline.
The NFL gets the stadium for one afternoon, potentially leaves behind a crime scene on the pitch, and Bayern Munich has to come in afterward and pretend everything is perfectly normal.
At least the NFL is picking up the tab, with up to €200,000 available for the damage. Still, perhaps someone should remind the visitors that the Allianz Arena is a football stadium, not a demolition derby venue.
Hopefully, the new surface survives longer than the old one. Bayern has enough problems without having to worry about whether the pitch can survive 90 minutes of football.
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