If the sound of lawn mowers is synonymous with the weekend, it won't get more Australian than 15 of them on a football field.
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More than two dozen volunteers with 15 lawn mowers took to overgrown fields at Towradgi in an effort to accelerate the return of junior football to Ray Robinson Oval.
Frustrated by the weather and the lack of Saturday morning sport, the Fernhill Junior Football Club took the matter into their collective hands and called it a "mowing spectacular".
"We put it out to the club and the parents of the members and said we were going to mow fields two and three of Towradgi Park," Fernhill Juniors Soccer Club president, Tim Fielding, said.
Continuous wet weather has left sports fields overgrown and damaged across the Illawarra.
"With the grounds being so wet, the tractors are getting too heavy to get on the fields. It's just a Catch-22 - if you don't mow it, it doesn't dry out," Mr Fielding said.
Usually a task for Wollongong City Council, the sodden grounds have made it difficult to for outdoor staff to use ride-on mowers.
"They don't have the machines, they don't have the lawnmowers, they don't have the people," Mr Fielding said.
"Imagine trying to get 20 council workers to mow Towradgi Park and times that by 30-40 grounds in the Illawarra, it's just not possible.
"Rather than sit around and wait for the council to do it when it eventually dries out, we were just trying to be proactive and hopefully get the kids on the pitch."
Normally the host of hundreds of games this far into the season, the Fernhill Football Club has barely kicked a ball.
"We've had maybe a dozen teams play at the most so far this season. Normally we would have had hundreds of games by now," Mr Fielding said.
Illawarra District Netball Association also has felt the impact of the wet weather.
Ten netball courts at Fairy Meadow's Guest Park are so overgrown, players have been forced to travel to Shellharbour for games.
"We understand this will add a little more travel time for the teams in the northern suburbs, but until the Berkeley court refurbishment is complete, we will continue to do what we can to keep everyone playing the game we all love," an Illawarra District Netball Association spokesperson said.
With the threat of more rain this week, the demand for more synthetic pitches has grown throughout the region.
The Illawarra has one synthetic soccer pitch in Kembla Grange and Mr Fielding believes the situation is unsatisfactory.
"We definitely, definitely need synthetic pitches. If this doesn't show that we need them, then I don't know what will," Mr Fielding said.
Football South Coast has announced a number of grounds are expected to be out of action for the next three to four weeks.