The new Arena Amazônia appeared unprepared on Thursday night to stage its first event, just 24 hours before it hosts England’s opening World Cup fixture against Italy, with groundsmen still attempting to improve the state of the pitch and cosmetic work ongoing inside and outside the stadium.

The Football Association’s technical staff chose not to visit the ground on Thursday evening, after the team’s four-hour flight from Rio de Janeiro, even though there have been admissions from the ground staff at the stadium that the pitch is not up to scratch. It was sandy, hard and dry despite a drenching from a lengthy rainstorm that had swept over the city the previous evening and a day of almost constant watering, with no prospect of much short-term improvement.

It was particularly threadbare in one of the goalmouths and was marked by lines running across the turf. Groundstaff were spraying the grass on Thursday evening, with Fifa unable to detail precisely what chemicals were being applied. “The pitch in Manaus has been undergoing treatment in preparation for the World Cup,” confirmed the game’s governing body in a statement. “Over the last three months, mitigation procedures have been put in place and there continues to be significant improvement. Pitch experts from Fifa and the local organising committee are satisfied the pitch will be ready for training and the matches, and have been based in Manaus to ensure that all proper procedures are in place.”

The FA chose not to visit the arena having been in touch with the Sports Turf Research Institute, which carried out some treatment to England’s training surface at their Urca base in Rio, and having been reassured that, while the pitch at the Arena Amazônia may not be aesthetically pleasing, it should play true. Although the £173m stadium is stunning from the outside, the area immediately around remains a frantic work in progress, with cables still being laid, the car park yet to be fully tarmacked and construction ongoing in some areas. Immediately inside the arena, masked locals were undertaking more cosmetic duties, hosing down the dusty entrance hall and corridors leading off into the arena that will be used by the players and staff of Italy and England as they arrive at the ground for the 6pm kick-off on Saturday. The VIP areas and mascot rooms remain empty shells, though the medical room is well stocked and fully functional, with staff on-site.

Hodgson’s team have been handed dressing room A and, although the changing spaces are relatively plush, work is clearly not complete on the surrounding area, with yellow stains on the walls and in the baths and piles of rubbish still to be collected. Conditions in dressing room B appear better, though it will still be a race against time to have both complete in advance of England and Italy training at the 42,000-capacity arena, with its lattice roof of diamond-shaped panels made to look like snake scales, on Friday evening.

The Italian delegation have confirmed they will not deviate from that plan despite their own technical staff, dispatched from their base in Mangaratiba, having been held up en route by strikes at Rio de Janeiro airport. “We’re not planning to change our schedule,” said the delegation chief, Demetrio Albertini. “We knew there was some burnt grass on the pitch due to the heat, but the colour of the grass doesn’t really matter.”

Those sentiments have been echoed by England’s players. “We’ve both got to play on it, whatever it is,” said Joe Hart. “They’ve worked day and night over here to make it the best it can be. We’ve got to appreciate we’re playing in the jungle, so we’ll take anything. Anything that means we’re playing in the World Cup, we’ll take.”

More worrying for England might arguably be the heat, with temperatures still in the high 20s at kick-off time on Thursday evening to ensure the success of the squad’s exhaustive preparation, in Portugal, Florida and now Brazil, will be tested. “We’ve done all we possibly can,” said Gary Cahill. “We’ve been training and playing in hot conditions now. Miami was roasting and we’ve experienced the humidity even over here in Brazil when we’ve trained.

“We’ve done the heat chambers, we’ve had the extra layers on in training, so we’ve done all we possibly can to feel prepared. It was good to come through the Honduras game in those conditions, because that’s roughly what we’re going to be facing in Manaus.

“You feel uncomfy in that heat. We’ve certainly adapted because the first couple of times we trained in the layers over in Portugal, it was tough. You wouldn’t normally feel as tired as we did after those sessions, but when we train now we recover and feel a lot better. So it’s obviously worked. I’ve spoken to a few of my Chelsea team-mates about Manaus, to Oscar and David Luiz, and they told me about the humidity. You just have to deal with it and accept this is what it’s like. It’s the same for both teams, after all. We’ll just crack on.”

The world players’ union, FifPro, has criticised conditions in Manaus given the heat and humidity in the city. “The players deserve a quality playing surface and conditions that reflect what is meant to be the world’s premier football event,” it said.