London Stadium is midway through a three-week transformation into a state-of-the-art ballpark ahead of a Major League Baseball two-game series between Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees later this month.
Having been granted access West Ham Football Club’s home stadium on June 6, Major League Baseball (MLB) is expected to complete the makeover by 27 June, ahead of the games on 29-30 June.
A team of 110 workers, 40 of whom have been drafted in from Canada, the USA, Mexico and Holland, have installed over 141,900 square feet of artificial turf from France on top of West Ham’s grass playing surface.
Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees have played 2,200 times in their history, but it will be the first time they have played each other on synthetic turf.
A series of 18m-tall foul poles and over 400 metres of fencing have all been installed, while the build of a batter’s eye, backstop, batting cages, dugouts, and temporary clubhouses are on-going.
Materials such as clay for the pitcher’s mound and home plate area, and 345 tonnes of dirt for the infield diamond have been shipped from the US, while the fence padding for the field’s perimeter has been brought in from Toronto and shipped out of Montreal, Canada.
Following the series, it is expected to take five days for London Stadium to return to its more familiar state.
