WORCESTER City have moved this weekend's league game with Longlevens to Sixways Stadium.

City will play their scheduled Hellenic League Premier clash at the 11,000-seater ground due to concerns over the state of their Claines Lane pitch.

There is forecast to be rain through Thursday night into Friday morning and after all the water last week, the Claines surface was unlikely to be playable on Saturday afternoon.

A City statement read: "Ahead of this weekend's scheduled home league fixture with Longlevens, we have consulted with all relevant parties, and with the sheer amount of rain we have had in the last week and with at least 12 hours of rain forecast to fall Thursday night into Friday, we have decided to move this weekend's fixture to Sixways Stadium.

A City statement read: "Ahead of this weekend's scheduled home league fixture with Longlevens, we have consulted with all relevant parties, and with the sheer amount of rain we have had in the last week and with at least 12 hours of rain forecast to fall Thursday night into Friday, we have decided to move this weekend's fixture to Sixways Stadium.

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"This decision is purely a football decision, it loses revenue for the Club, as with when we used Malvern, but our overriding priority is to ease fixture congestion (16 at least left to play currently) and assist Chris and the team fulfil our footballing targets."

As the statement mentions, City have already played games away from Claines this season. They played two of their scheduled home matches at Malvern Town's HDAnywhere Community Stadium (also artificial surface) over the Christmas period due to concerns over their home pitch.

City are facing a back-log of games in the last two and a half months of the 2023/24 campaign as it is and with the first team still competing on four fronts - two league cups, Isuzu FA Vase and the league title - the club wants to avoid any more postponements.

The club will be hopeful of a big gate on Saturday to make up for the costs of holding the game at the old home of Worcester Warriors. The attendance will likely be around the 1000 mark given its 'one-off' nature, especially after 1500 made the short trip to Stourport Swifts to watch City progress in the FA Vase on Saturday.

A similar crowd packed into Sixways for the first-ever Worcester Derby back in August, when City beat Worcester Raiders 1-0.