------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I would rather sit in a packed Liberty Stadium than an MK Dons empty bowl - no thank you. When the Liberty was built it's capacity was based on certain facts. The facts are that in our history we had been in the top division for only 2 years and our average attendances over a sustained period were well below 10,000. Using your arguement, every Club that is thinking of building a new stadium should build one for when they are in the Premiership. That just doesn't happen. We are in a bonus period of the Clubs history, so just sit back and enjoy it rather than quibble about the size of our stadium. In fact it could be used to our advantage because we can build up quite a "warm" atmosphere in the ground. The Sports Council issue is a red herring. SCFC could have built a 50,000 seater stadium - but it could not afford it! Therfore we had to rely on third parties to HELP us. SCW only have a certain budget to work with. We should be thanking SCW. We are lucky to have the Liberty - enjoy. NB: Football displaced athletics and athletics had to be re-located to the University track (the £3million quoted wouldn't have made a significant difference to the size of the stadium).
The £3m wasn't used for the stadium at all, it was used to move the athletics from there, and I am using the MK dons stadium as an example as the 25k stadium we were supposed to have would have been similar if I remember rightly, and as the funding came from the sale of land for a retail park, little if anything came from the council directly! To build something that is nigh on impossible to upgrade is a traversy , no stadium should be built that way , you look up the road and an upgrade option is available, and if you look at the funding they had with virtually the same crowd numbers in the last 10 years, you can see no vision has been used at all
The whole reason we are having this debate is because we have made it to the Premier league. If we were still in the championship we wouldnt be selling out every game and wouldnt have this problem. Remember Newcaste at home 2 seasons ago, massive game and we couldnt sell it out because Wales were playing in the rugby. I agree with what Bangkok has been saying above We were lucky to get a ground of this quality and size when we were in the bottom of the football league pyramid. I do agree there should have been something to extend the size if needed but the original size of £20500 has been perfect for us. I think building an all seater 20500 stadium when we were in League 2 shows ambition more than anything and no one at that time could see us getting to the premier league. I personally never thought id see it in my life time
Yes lucky to get a stadium of that size, but a massive own goal that the stadium cannot be upgraded if needs must, when you sped £30m on something you expect it to fit the needs for many years! The fact is that there has been a monumental amount of incompetence in this case, the ground should have the same ability to be upgraded as the CCS up the road! It will probably be cheaper to build a new stadium with funding coming from the likes of hotels or retail outlets than it is to upgrade our stadium now, and lets face it, why would the club pay for an upgrade without owning the stadia? Really the people who agreed this should be shot because of their short-sightedness!
------------------------------------------------------------------------ I am fully aware that money was used to relocate the athletics facility. You are fully entitled to use the KM Dons stadium as an example. But not many people want to sit in an empty gold fish bowl - ask the Ospreys fans. Part of the funding came from the sale of land for a retail park. That money belonged to the people of The City and County of Swansea so it came directly from the Council. When the stadium was built we certainly didn't have crowd figures similair to Cardiff - neither did we last season, when we got promoted to the Premiership. In March 2011, when we were in the top 3 or 4 of the Championship chasing promotion to the Premiership, we were offering discounted tickets to fans because we couldn't fill the stadium. Vision has been used - based on hard facts. You do not build stadiums based on fantasy. If the Swans were unhappy with the original Liberty design they could have withdrawn from the deal. They didn't because they were chuffed with the stadium. When the Club is able to afford a bigger stadium or when it wishes to expand, it can build one with its own cash rather than rely on third parties. You cannot expect taxpayers to pay for your dreams.
Come on, the fact that the council sold a largely disused piece of land that they owned is hardly making anything for the city, now that retailers are there they are making a whole lot of money from them, third parties are used in virtually all stadiums being built, and have been for years! And the MK dons example shows that they had the vision to have something built that could be expanded! Using figures from last year is not an issue, Cardiff were in onion park before that, they were having about the same amount of people going there as us, if you look back when cardiff got promoted to the championship or div1 back then, their crowd number were the same, they have slowly built up to what the swans were getting at about 12k-13k a game, in fact the swans for 3 years were getting larger crowds than cardiff and we were a league lower! And how can you say vision has been used, we can't upgrade the bloody stadium unless £15m-£20m is spent doing major structural work, if we are lucky it can be expanded by 3k with added seats in dead space
That largely “disused piece of land” accounted for nearly 40% of the cost of the stadium and it came from Council coffers. I am fully aware that third parties are used in the construction of stadiums these days – this places limitations on what the Club could expect. As it was, the Club were nearly going out of the Football League at the time and were delighted to have the Liberty. Without SCW and the Council we would still be at The Vetch. The vision, by the Council, Swans and SCW, of a Club 92nd in the football league was fully met. Cardiff City were in the top half of the Championship when their stadium was built – promotion to the Premiership was more realistic and the stadium was built accordingly. Our expectations have been raised because the Board have been successful in taking the Club to the Premier League. A few weeks ago many Swans fans would still say that we were not going to get there. Do we need a bigger stadium? Probably - for a season or two. Then it would be a long term white elephant. Could we expand? Probably not. The environmental impact of a 30,000 seater stadium in Landore would be unacceptable anyway.
The vision when you spend £30m is to have the ability to use the stadium for many years to come, without the need to upgrade the facility by spending tens of millions on it, we are the only professional club in this area, of course interest was high when we came up to the league 1 and into a new stadium. To spend a vast fortune on stadia its got to meet the needs and ambitions of the club, to limit the stadium by refusing a grant if we build a 25k stadium speaks to me of no vision for either club, and I disagree with the white elephant term, we have been at about 70% usage of the stadium since we have been there, it doesn't take a rocket science to know that the stadium is suitable for anywhere below premier league! So the vision has not been fully met at all, in fact its complete incompetence not have the ability to upgrade, its a complete failure and is the white elephant you say as we are turning people away right now
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Club has spent all of it's existence, bar two years, outside the top league. It doesn't take rocket science to tell you that statistically you should build a stadium accordingly.
I agree with Jager. Not having a stadium upgrade option built into the design is a travesty. Yes, we never expected to be in the Premier League so soon - but the fact remained that we were a club operating in the Football League and the possibility was there for us to be promoted within 2 years of the stadium opening. What you expect should not rule over the possibilities. The stadium should have been built with a potential, low cost, upgrade available. The Liberty is great for this season, but if we manage to stay up, and there's still the possibility that we'll do it comfortably, then 20,500 minus segregation is not good enough for the Premier League any longer. We talk about our average attendances a lot, but what hasn't been mentioned is the away figures. In the championship, we actually quite often came close to selling out, or actually did sell out, our 16,000-17,000 home allocation. The away attendances were often very poor with teams coming a long way to us without a great team to support. That won't happen in the Premiership - we'll have away teams selling out, and that will actually bump up our average attendance by around 2,000 without taking into account the extra interest from home fans.
Which they did, but how the hell can they spend so much money and have practically no ability to expand if the need comes, let's face facts here, £30m spent on a stadium only 6 years ago and it's obsolete now, where is the accountability for the incompetence ?
If we had followed your logic, we would have built a 60,000 seater stadium for Champions League. That is called a white elephant. In one of our most successful ever seasons our average gate was 15,700. You do not build (or expand) your stadium for short term blips. You build your stadium based on long term forecasts and existing facts.
With respects you are speaking garbage, I said there is no ability to expand not to build a huge stadium to begin with, if you followed your logic we would have had a stadium with 10k maximum , really when you are spending a fortune on something like this there must be an ability to expand if the needs must, and long term forecasts is the promotion of the club to the premier league, the available facts as you put it was 8k fans turning up!
Yes, I would have expected a stadium of about 15,000. So to build a stadium of 20000 plus surpassed my expectations. Statistically, it is still more than adequate for the LONG term future of the Club. You do not build an extension to your house if you are having visitors for the weekend.
PGF - Your logic astounds me. Why would we build a stadium fit for the Champions League? The point we are making is that by building a stadium which has not got the capability of expanding, you shoot yourself in the foot when you do become successful, and even more so if you maintain the success. I fully agree with the point that we have had a stadium built for us that has been the correct size for us, up until now. If we get relegated this season, there's no need to worry about it, the decision is made for us. But if we stay up, and if we have a very competent season doing it, then the talks must strengthen for some kind of expansion. I'm not talking about 30,000-40,000, I'm talking adding another 5,000-8,000 seats. An expansion plan wouldn't have added too much to the original build cost, but would have made expansion a hell of a lot cheaper if we ever did do it. Unfortunately, now it's going to cost a bomb if we do ever expand - and if we don't expand and we continue to be successful, we'll have to live with the fact that a) there'll be a lot of disappointed, ticketless fans, and b) the club will be losing out on a lot of potential revenue/profit from this problem.
"You do not build an extension to your house if you are having visitors for the weekend." No, but if after a lengthened stay, the visitors want to stay for longer than planned, you got a problem.
--------------------------- As is the case with quite a few Premiership clubs. ---------------------------------------------------- Statistically there will be no lengthy stay - although we can dream.
Okay your logic then, you have a house with 3 bedrooms which is fine as you have a spare for guests, but then you have another child which needs the spare room, now you have a choice either expand the house, or buy a new one if you want guests to stay, now most houses have the ability to expand given permission and money! Now transfer that logic to a stadium, we have no ability to expand as no ability has been built into the fabric of the building, oh unless we spend 10s of millions, which begs the question why no such thing was put there, wouldn't you be asking questions of this logic by the council, they agreed the plans which is obviously the cheapest possible proposition , wonder what happened to the rest of the money though, because the infrastructure promised has never been built! What has happened to the train station ? What has happened to the underpass to allow people to cross the road ?
If we followed stats for everything there should only be teams with 30k plus supporters at every game, and there would be no promotion and relegation, so your point has no meaning !
