AS this thrilling season goes down to the proverbial wire, the stadium debate has also quietly moved into a pivotal phase.
With Knowsley council’s planning decision looming on the horizon - and then the all-important Government call-in response - it will hopefully be sooner rather than later when we know if The Kirkby Project is going to happen.
It will be a blessed relief for many of us.
The constant barrage of claims, counter claims, lies and counter lies - not to mention cameos from players like Development Securities and Bestway - has become tiresome.
If we’re Kirkby-bound, then I’d like to know. If not, then I’d like to know if Keith Wyness has been busy preparing a Plan B in spite of his infamous declaration that, well.....there wasn’t one.
But one stadium story caught my attention and flared a bit of indignation this week. It was written by our industry reporter (and Street-end season ticket holder) Neil Hodgson.
The story was about Sainsbury’s considering building a new stadium for the blues in Walton Hall Park.
Neil reported that the supermarket group held meetings with Liverpool council leader Warren Bradley last August - and although they are not progressing the plans, they did not rule out revisiting them if the Kirkby plan fell through.
The original proposal to build a ground on Walton Hall Park was mooted by Liverpool businessman John Seddon, who set up Mersey Cablevision in the 1980s which was eventually taken over and became Telewest.
Below is an excerpt from the article.
He said: “Sainsbury’s were one of the people interested in the whole concept of Walton Hall Park and took a serious interest, as Tesco have in Kirkby.
“They presented a brochure to myself and Liverpool council.
Mr Bradley told the ECHO today that he rejected the proposal to build on park land but offered the neighbouring Longmoor Lane Industrial Estate as an alternative.
Mr Seddon added: “Following the meeting with (Warren) Bradley Sainsbury’s withdrew, but said if it did raise its head again they would be interested.
“I think Walton Hall Park, even in spite of what Warren Bradley is saying, is a fabulous place for a ground. It is a no-mark park that has trouble with youths on motorbikes and is used by only a small amount of people.”
He also believes Everton is attracting interest as a takeover target by international investors and said: “I think a ground there would be attractive.”
Two things particularly caught my attention;
1) Warren Bradley rejecting the proposal of building on public park land.
OK to be fair to Warren he has always been against this and it wasn’t his administration that gave Liverpool permission for Stanley Park (or refused it to Everton earlier) but the lack of fairness is astonishing.
If Everton ever have a realistic* chance of building a stadium on Walton Hall Park the council surely must be obliged to allow it.
Walton Hall Park is largely under-used and would benefit from a ground without being totally lost. Equally Warren has repeatedly said he doesn't’ want Everton to leave the city and I’m afraid offering some no-mark site on Longmoor Lane in Aintree isn’t good enough.
* The real barrier to Sainsbury’s plan would be whther they could ever match Tesco’s enabling retail development which allegedly makes Kirkby affordable to the blues. I suspect they couldn’t.
2) Everton is attracting interest as a takeover target by international investors.
Could this be the recent, subdued rumours concerning Russian interest? Would any mooted takeover be more likely after we’ve gone to Kirkby or if Kirkby fell through?
It’s interesting stuff and, despite what the club says, the issues are intrinsically linked with David Moyes’ future.
We now know Kirkby will cost us £78m. So far every other option put forward would likely cost us a lot more than that.
But if Kirkby gets de-railed, what are we going to do? As Keith Wyness has said, we can’t afford to do nothing.
There is going to come a point when Goodison simply won’t get its annual safety certificate anymore.
Yet the nagging feeling persists that we may be better following Arsenal's example of building a strong team, worldwife profile and established place in the top five BEFORE parting with the massive stadium bucks.
You only have to look at the fortunes of Coventry, Derby, Southampton, Leicester and Manchester City to see what can happen when clubs try and do it the other way round.
- Post to:
del.icio.us
Digg
Newsvine
Nowpublic
Reddit
« Previous | Home | Next »
Stevo wrote...
Same as everyone else there's loads to say on this but I've really two main points:
Completley agree with your last comment. As we've said before we'd only realistically fill a new 50,000 seater stadium maybe three times a season. Lets get our house in order on the field first. Every month a new piece of development land is mooted so if Tesco are serious then they will wait or at least ensure the plans are watertight and more importantly in the best interests of both parties for a smooth transition.
We must be a very attractive proposition for investors at present and EFC give the impression of a lapdog at Tescos beck and call.
We Are Everton and we should make any potential investor work FOR our support.
Second point: Viva Drogba.
Posted by: Stevo | May 1, 2008 12:16 PM