Conflicting opinions on playing surface for Copa América at Cowboys’ AT&T Stadium

AT&T Stadium is the home to the Dallas Cowboys NFL team, but boasts the ability to transform its surface into several different types of playing fields. This was put into action for the Copa América soccer tournament, which requires real grass rather than the artificial turf the football players use.

Mixed reviews about the grass at AT&T Stadium

The first of three Copa América games that the Cowboys’ stadium will host was last Friday when Chile and Peru faced off in a match that ended in a 0-0 draw. Neither Chile’s manager Ricardo Garcea nor Peru’s manager Jorge Fossati were happy about the playing surface at the stadium. Peruvian captain Luis Advincula had to leave the game early after suffering an Achilles injury, which Fossati blamed on the grass.

“I realize that this is a grass field today, but it’s not normal grass,” said Fossati. " It’s not grass that’s born and grows. It’s grass they bring in from somewhere else…that can be a bit harder and it can affect you in that exact place [the Achilles]. I’m not a doctor, but I’ve been around soccer for a few years. Achilles injuries can be caused by that as well.”

Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, who came up with the vision for the stadium and is very proud of its design, would not be happy to learn that it’s not up to standard for some teams. The U.S. men’s national team, however, did have good things to say about the field after their match against Bolivia on Sunday, when they won 2-0. That’s in contrast to the previous criticism of the playing surface in March.

USMNT midfielders Weston McKennie and Tyler Adams both commented on the field’s improvements.

“It was world’s apart of a difference - the pitch at Nations League and the pitch that we played on tonight,” McKennie said. “A lot better conditions and obviously you can see you can play better quality football. Balls aren’t popping up all over the place. They did a good job.”

“The pitch was definitely better now, 100 percent,” said Adams. “I’m not one to complain about the pitch too much. You still have to play football at the end of the day. The game isn’t going to stop because of the pitch. But this pitch was 100 percent better.”

Perhaps if it was your first time playing on the field, the difference between a standard grass soccer field and the installed grass football field is what would stick out, whereas the improvements over time would be more noticeable to someone who’s played on the installed grass field before.

There is one more game left for Dallas to get it right. AT&T Stadium will host the quarterfinal match between the winners of Group A and runners-up of Group B on Friday, July 5.