Building our own (smaller) stadium would entail the small matter of finding about £10-12M from somewhere. Any ideas?
Not necessarily, it can still be owned by the Council, paid for by the sale of the DCBL for housing. A new, smaller capacity venue, would be more appropriate, and cheaper to maintain.
Paulie xx
Like renting a house and asking your landlord to sell it and buy somewhere else because you fancy a move? Maybe the Council are ok with the current stadium.
As soon as the Council said they were selling 'Naughton Park' for housing, there'd be thousands up in arms.
On a practical view the Council has land available for housing but I can't see anyone rushing to build a stadium for a club that is static in terms of SL. The cost of demolishing the existing stadium would be steep at any rate.
When the stadium was built the rush was for 'safety' after the Hillsborough tragedy, with all seaters being the objective and our stadium was built accordingly. Of course standards slipped as memory faded!!!and standiums were OK again.
Cash was available from Sport England etc, that is no longer forthcoming, so good luck with HBC funding it!!
We still had visions of being top SL standard again too, don't forget!
But back to the here and now, we need a good showing on Saturday with a strong crowd support. This game will be what prompts peoples minds when ST's come on sale!!!!!
Even if it is only for one game, it would be nice to make an appearance in the play offs. I think we have deserved that this year, I know there's been some shockers, but there's been some really good performances too.
For the first time in years I've actually looked forward to the games, and a play off game would top that off for me.
With Wakey probably going up and London coming down it hopefully points to a very tight and competitive league next year and we can see how tight it is if you take Wakefield out of it.
We really need to win at least one of the remaining games - our injury list sadly fills me with despair.
A heck of a lot will be riding on the result of our last game of the season.
Like many others on here, I thought that we would struggle at the bottom end of the table this year. To be within reach of a play-off spot with two games to go was probably beyond our expectations, so well done to the coach and the team.
I am sure that Coleman will be challenging the players to end the season on a high, with two wins.
My guess is that one win will be enough to grab sixth spot. It would be great if we can work out a win in our last home game of the season on Saturday, in front of our biggest home crowd of the season.
We will probably get a car full from Toulouse, so it is up to Widnes fans to turn out in numbers and for the Club to try and sell the game around the town.
The lack of consistency can show the results of chopping and changing and importing loanees etc to allow for injuries etc. All in all I, along with other posters, have enjoyed the season. OK we are, at last, building a stronger team to look forward to next year, with hopefully more signings to come. Entering a play-off with a fairly predictable outcome isn't really what we need but it's a start!
As far as the stadium is concerned I can't see the benefit for HBC to even contemplate it.
The East and West stands cost nothing if they are not occupied. They house facilities that the Council might want to use or rent out.
The North stand in its constricted for seems to work OK with reduced stewarding requirements. The atmosphere in the North stand is better than when it was spread out.
The South stand may need some trimming and rearrangement but would probably save money.
The South Stand also contains facilities for conferences and social events, weddings etc,etc, The West stand under-croft also houses useful facilities that can be marketed.
From a spectators viewpoint the ground looks great and more akin to a 'stadium' than many SL clubs and that can attract players and public alike.
I see Huddersfield are looking at a new,smaller ground.Now there's a club playing at a stadium too big for them.Not sure why but there's a few clubs in west Yorkshire with potential for good crowds but they aren't one of them.No interest for some reason.
Huddersfield are currently averaging 4,000. They seem to think that if they move to a smaller ground, the improved atmosphere will mean that results on the pitch improve. I'm not so sure.