The Adams Park pitch is two years past its shelf life, says Wycombe Wanderers Trust chairman Trevor Stroud who stated decisions will be made soon about whether to replace the surface.

Blues’ vice-president Ivor Beeks is responsible for the pitch and any decisions made on the matter will be done so by the club’s former chairman.

Beeks installed the Desso pitch, which is currently down at Adams Park, in 2002 at a joint estimated cost of £500,000 with former tenants Wasps.

Four home games remain this season and Stroud says decisions will be made shortly.

“There is a management committee looking at that at the moment. Decisions have to be taken fairly shortly because the work has to start as soon as the season ends, which we hope is May 2,” he said.

“The pitch is at the end of its shelf life. The Desso pitch has a shelf life of ten years and it’s been down 12 years. There are some key decisions that have to be made and that’s a football club matter.

“Our vice president Ivor Beeks is responsible for the pitch and he’s got a team of experts around him who offers advice and suggestions.”

At the launch of the Trust's share scheme chairman Andrew Howard fielded a question on the possibility of having junior teams back on the pitch at half-time to take penalties, a suggestion he quashed as those activities do further damage to the pitch. 

He said the decision to stop the activity had to be taken as Wasps' leaving present to Wanderers was to "finish off the pitch and kill it". 

To replace the current Desso pitch with a new like-for-like surface would cost in the region of £850,000 according to Howard something he says is just not affordable and the club will instead look to restore it over the course of the next three years. 

The chairman said £25-30,000 will likely be spent on the pitch each summer for the next three years to restore it, saying the centre circle has been measured for hardness and came out as hard as concrete. 

He even said that opposition teams visiting Adams Park are instructed that they can only train on certain parts of the pitch. 

Taking the pitch out would also be too expensive for the club, with a standard grass pitch expected to cost an additional £150,000. 

In reply to a question from a members’ meeting in September 2013 the Trust admitted that even back then situation was being discussed.

They said: “The ‘Desso’ pitch is nearing the end of its life and therefore, for the longer term, we will have to decide whether to have another tenant and replace the pitch with one that can withstand two teams, or have a standard (and much cheaper) pitch for ourselves only.”

Manager Gareth Ainsworth has been critical of the surface this season and told the Bucks Free Press last month that the pitch was affecting the way he wanted Blues to play.

He said: “I do say that our pitch needs a bit of work and hopefully we can get that. The rugby really has hammered it.

“Our groundsman does a fantastic job, they really do as much as they can, but they’re fighting a losing battle because the pitch has been hammered over the years. It’s really hard, the ball bounces really high and these things do affect it.”