What were the stewards looking for on the pitch at Walsall?

[Horney]

Pre-kick off yesterday, there were lines of stewards going very slowly, up and down the penalty area in front of us. It was the kind of deliberate and forensic type searching that you see at crime scenes.
My mate quipped to a touchline steward.." what are they looking for -
grass ! "....to which he replied..." no - nails ! "
We were incredulous and asked for more details. Apparently, to get the frost out of the pitch, the groundstaff had been lighting hot braziers. They had been breaking up pallets to feed the fires and wanted to make sure that no nails had found their way onto the pitch.
Good job there was no Health and Safety executive around !

 

[chinners]

kuipers and the goalkeepering coach complained to the ref about something a few minutes before the stewards did there walk across the pitch

 

[Everest]

No magnetic roller?
How amateurish.

 

[wolfie]

Grass ?

 

[strings]

kuipers and the goalkeepering coach complained to the ref about something a few minutes before the stewards did there walk across the pitch

Kuipers said the pitch was unplayable to the Goalkeeping coach - I was near enough to hear that. He did that just after throwing the ball into the air to see how well it would bounce (it didn't bounce at all!). I haven't got a clue what he said to the ref.

I also thought it was strange that the stewards were looking for something on the pitch.

 

[Shropshire Seagull]

My mate went up and asked ...

Apparently, to dry out the top surface, they had been wheeling a wood burner over the grass to warm it up. Unfortunately, said mobile wood burner was loaded up with wood that still had nails in it. When the wood had burn't the nails were nowhere to be seen - obviously on the pitch somewhere. So stewards were instructed to "search and rescue" lost nails ....