Monday night's World Football Challenge match between the Vancouver Whitecaps and Manchester City is officially a go, the Whitecaps announced Monday afternoon.
Match officials surveyed the pitch at Empire Field and determined that the newly laid grass is in a playable condition for the scheduled 10 pm ET kickoff (ESPN2, ESPN Deportes).
The Whitecaps’ match against Real Salt Lake was postponed on Saturday after the temporary grass field installed for the WFC match was waterlogged and deemed unplayable after heavy rainfall. Ground crews have since worked around the clock to manually remove water from the field surface, including using vacuums and sub pumps. The grass was also trimmed on Monday morning in preparation for the match.
WATCH: Team of workers drain Empire Field surface
“Without the hard work and dedication of our restoration crew, we would not be in a position to play tonight’s match,” Vancouver Whitecaps FC chief executive officer Paul Barber said in a statement on Monday afternoon. “I would like to thank all of our staff, and of course our fans, for their support during the past days as we worked on a solution for tonight’s match.”
The forecast in Vancouver for kickoff called for partly cloudy skies and temperatures in the high 60s.
