Goggles & Flippers

Another point I've mentioned before, but I think it's worth giving it a post of its own in this thread, is the proposed training facility at Dalziel Park. When the plans were first published, I gave my thoughts on the design and, if I'm honest, I hope the final product is significantly more ambitious than what's shown in the planning documents. However, with the extraordinary tsunami of transfer income we've generated this summer, I think it's only right that we revisit whether Dalziel Park still represents the best long-term investment for the club. The documents submitted to North Lanarkshire Council describe this as Phase 1. That consists of the new building, equipment/storage sheds and converting the running track pitch to an all-weather surface with floodlights. That wording itself suggests/infers there will be a Phase 2? What does that look like? Upgrading the five-a-side pitches? Covering one with indoor dome? Additional parking? Or does it ultimately make sense to become a full club base, allowing us to move operations away from K-Park and cease renting? If that's the intention, there are further costs to consider. We'd need facilities capable of hosting Women's and Academy fixtures. Under current SWPL 1 ground regulations, the minimum capacity is 1,300 spectators. At present we effectively work around this by using K-Park, which only holds around 660 spectators (400 seated). A permanent home would also require things such as (from SWPL guidance): Broadcast-standard floodlighting. A press area. A main camera gantry on the halfway line. A reliable secondary power supply. Dugouts meeting competition regulations. Appropriate changing facilities and supporting infrastructure. When the plans first appeared, a few people took a punt and estimated the building alone at somewhere between £1.5 million and £2.2 million, which doesn't seem unreasonable. Looking at comparable projects, the additional infrastructure isn't insignificant either. FIFA Quality Pro artificial pitch including engineered sub-base, shock pad and drainage: £850k-£1.1m Broadcast-standard floodlighting: £150k-£250k Backup generator and associated services: £80k-£100k A modest 1,300-capacity stand with changing rooms, media facilities and basic hospitality: I'd struggle to see this coming in at much under £1.2m Additional parking, landscaping and site works: £150k+ Obviously not everything would necessarily happen at once, but it's not difficult to see the total investment reaching £4-5 million over any multiple phases. The other aspect I'm less clear on is ownership. Dalziel Park is a charitable trust and, unless I've misunderstood the arrangement, Motherwell wouldn't actually own the land. We may have an excellent long-term lease with favourable terms, but ultimately it would still be a major investment on a site we don't control as an asset. Happy to be corrected if I've got that wrong. None of this is intended as criticism of any Dalziel Park facility. If the club proceeds with it, it will be a significant improvement on what we have now. Few clubs are co-located but that's down to land availability, if Celtic cold have secured 10 acres beside Parkhead, would they still prefer Lennoxtown? What I'm really asking is whether this summer has changed the equation. If Ravenscraig has now entered the fray to genuinely being considered for a new stadium, should we pause before committing several million pounds on Dalziel Park's phase 1 & possibly 2 and ask whether some or all of that investment would be better directed towards a wider football campus instead? We'd still need at least three full-size grass training pitches for rotation, along with 5/7-a-side pitches. But many of the expensive elements we're potentially talking about at Dalziel Park .... hospitality, changing rooms, media facilities, floodlighting, generators, kitchens, parking, offices, catering and security, would already exist as part of a wider stadium development. Would a gym block booked from 9-12 Monday to Friday not be monetised to the public outside those hours? The biggest challenge is the main playing surface. A natural grass stadium pitch simply isn't designed to cope with 40-plus competitive matches every season, particularly when the women's season extends into the summer and removes much of the recovery and renovation window grounds staff traditionally rely on. That raises an interesting question. Is there a technically and financially viable way of incorporating an interchangeable natural grass and artificial surface (or second grass pitch) within the stadium footprint? It would undoubtedly consume a significant portion of any savings made elsewhere and add considerable engineering complexity, so it's far from a cheap solution. However, if it could be achieved, the benefits are substantial. You'd create a venue capable of operating virtually 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. It could host first-team, women's and academy football, community use, multi-sport events and commercial hires, while ensuring every Motherwell FC team has a permanent home on a single site. The increased utilisation would also create revenue opportunities that simply aren't available from a stadium that's used for a couple of dozen afternoons each year. Maybe the answer is still Dalziel Park. Maybe a split-site model remains the best option. But even with a rebuilt POD there would be a host of duplication of facilities with Dalziel Park and a weekday disconnect that doesn't exist currently. I'm just not convinced that, after the financial position we've put ourselves in this summer, it isn't worth stepping back and asking whether our long-term infrastructure strategy should be a little more ambitious than it looked 12 months ago.

Happy to counter it, because I don't think we're actually disagreeing as much as it might seem. I completely accept a new stadium will have ongoing maintenance costs. Every stadium does. My point wasn't that, once the borrowing is paid off, every penny suddenly becomes available for players. It was that the financing cost disappears, while the additional revenue streams remain. The comparison also has to be against Fir Park, not against a hypothetical stadium with zero costs. Fir Park already requires ongoing maintenance, and as it heads towards 100 years old those costs are only likely to increase. Any new stadium will also need upkeep, but as that stadium moves into it's third decade from completion you'd expect significantly lower major maintenance requirements than we're facing with Fir Park with a replaced POD or not. So the question becomes whether the extra revenue comfortably exceeds both the financing costs while the debt exists, and the lifecycle maintenance costs afterwards. Just to illustrate why I think it does, I'll use deliberately very conservative assumptions. To avoid inflation muddying the waters, let's assume 2026 revenues and 2026 costs throughout and assume a hypothetical key hand over in 2030 and last mortgage payment in 2050. The gap between income and expenditure should remain broadly comparable in real terms as inflation is difficult to predict. Attendances - I've proposed an 18–20k stadium. We look like we'll have around 5,500–6,000 season ticket holders this season thanks in part to Jens. Twenty years from now I've assumed only another 2,000 added to our home gate, giving a regular home support of around 8,000. That's hardly an ambitious forecast and a modest year on year increase even with the novelty of a new stadium. Using the figures the club published through Our Club, Our Future above and supplied to the WS by the club. An extra 2,000 home supporters works out at roughly £343k per season. Allowing for VAT and rounding down, I've only credited £275k. Away support - I've assumed increasing the Old Firm allocation from the current McLean capacity (around 4,800) to 10,000. Using a Cat A ticket price of £33, deducting VAT and allowing for concessions gives an average of roughly £24 per seat. 3.5 Old Firm home games per season × 5,000 extra seats = around £420k, which I've rounded down to £400k. I've also assumed Hearts bring around 7,000 supporters once or twice a season. So using an average of 1.5 games gives another £60k, again rounded down. Commercial and hospitality - Motherwell's published commercial income in 2024/25 was around £985k. St Johnstone generated around £1.2m in the same period, despite averaging considerably smaller crowds. If a modern stadium with vastly improved hospitality, double the current average attendance, conferencing and sponsorship opportunities. Increased commercial income of £450k, I'd argue that's a very cautious estimate. Non-matchday restaurant - Instead of a hospitality suite sitting empty for most of the week, sweat the asset and open it to the public. 70 covers per day (split between lunch and dinner). Average spend £24. 320 trading days. That's around £540k turnover. A well-run independent restaurant might make 12–18% net profit, but I've assumed only £60k profit. Office space Subletting office space to organisations like the Well Society, community partners or other tenants: £50k. Naming rights Most research I've found suggests £100k–150k is achievable. I've only assumed £80k. Caveat: some of the above income would be available to a revamped Fir Park, just not with the same opportunity or amounts. A new stadium would offer a tripling of our hospitality offerings and space in a modern environment that is now expected. Our attendances however will forever be locked at 13,000 with no scope to exploit the OF. The Hunter always having columns obscuring the view unless we rebuild with a novel bit of structural engineering. So from above, an ultra conservative £1.375m that becomes available. that's before we even start talking about concerts, exhibitions, conferences, functions, improved catering, additional sponsorship inventory, or other events. Combine with what we must spend every year on a creaking Fir Park or even a Fir Park with a new POD, can you honestly envisage maintenance of over £1.7m every single year needed? So yes, there will absolutely be maintenance costs. But unless those maintenance costs somehow exceed the additional recurring revenue every single year, the principle still holds. Once the borrowing is gone, the debt repayments disappear, but the extra revenue streams continue and ultimately funnel into the football department. That's really the point I was trying to make.

It's a massive investment and while this summer is an eye-popping perfect storm, three years ago selling K** for £550k was seen as a coup, it would be a brave supporter of this football club to suggest we can mimic it again in the near future. But maybe a Watt style £2m here or there is a new datum thanks to our style and approach. I get within our psyche there is a need for a rainy day mindset, the WS was created to offer it after all. It's a thing in this part of the world because we're no stranger to economic upheaval and a feeling of few sunny days to make our hay. The overall cost is at first glance potentially frightening, we have the jeopardy of relegation always hanging over us, our new found wealth is in theory an insulator and in worst case scenarios, a January slush fund to buy our way to safety. Un upgraded POD is upheaval for 15 months ideally so a whole season lost of its hospitality offering and temporary costs to relocate changing rooms and other functions held within the stand. After completion, there would be an uptake on hospitality going forward, maybe we can make the building sweat its assets seven days a week if it's restaurant is open the same as Tynecastle. We won't alter the capacity of Fir Park or the general aesthetic. Then we move on to the other stands assessing their triage order. A new stadium offers it to be built and commissioned similar to Everton with Goodison and the Hill Dickinson, where you move without upheaval or penalty. I've tried to illustrate how every extra 1,000 seats made available to OF or Hearts supporters realises approximately £2m over the 20 year life of any finance arrangement. I think what's important, we sell someone for say £2m in future, we can dump that into our mortgage, financing the stadium isn't solely down to increased attendances, hospitality and additional uses, player trading will always be part of the club and if co-located with our academy/training facility can be very much justiifed. However, the main thing which I haven't highlighted yet is when the stadium is paid off, early or on time, from that day forward the increased revenues generated flow directly and solely into the football department and academy in perpetuity.

I really don’t get why anyone defaults to think that if we do move we’ll endeavour to build the single worst thing we can devoid of any merit or atmosphere. I’ve only ever see St Mirren but our sloppy seconds than the other way round. I think to convince people it’s more about human nature. I’m often drawn to something I studied while at uni. The Golden Gate Bridge was initially opposed be literally everyone. Today it’s inconceivable to imagine San Francisco without it and it’s universally loved as a cultural icon. Groups: U.S. War Department Feared the bridge would obstruct military operations or, if destroyed in war, block the entrance to San Francisco Bay. Shipping companies Thought it would interfere with navigation and large ships entering the harbour. Southern Pacific / Golden Gate Ferries Didn’t want to lose their profitable ferry monopoly. Sierra Club and conservationists Argued it would scar the natural landscape and damage the environment. Taxpayer groups Believed it was far too expensive and financially reckless, especially during the Depression. Board of Supervisors and civic leaders Worried about debt, toll revenue and political risk. Engineers Claimed it couldn’t survive the currents, winds and fog. Strauss’ original design was mocked as an “upside-down rat trap.” Residents and preservationists Felt it would ruin the beauty and character of the Golden Gate and Marin Headlands. More detail here: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/goldengate-opposition

Everyone is funnelled into a 4m wide gate to leave. Theres no scope for any ancillary sales or expansion. The space under us can’t be used. It is limited for disabled access and its roof will need replaced soon. Due to the curve of Knowetop Avenue it cuts the corner off the Cooper (it’s stepped in) the. If massive wall has to be maintained, we looked to demolish it 15 years ago and told no. WS looking at funding a lift. The Cooper bar is a particularly uninspiring space. The POD has a very narrow footprint, the width of the centenary interrupted by columns define it. Upstairs rooms such as the 91 suite can effectively fit 12 chairs abreast with an access corridor down the middle. boardroom Even smaller. above the sponsors lounge is now taken over by the media team I understand. None of these facilities are enough or fitting for a club looking to close its operational funding gap.

A school playground, a street that cuts off the coroner of the Cooper and a couple of houses that ensure the Main stand can never stretch the full length of the pitch while sitting on a residential street for me shows no amount of money can remedy the limitations of FP.

Is there any amount of money we could have in the bank and your be OK with a switch or is FP only regardless or anything else?

I think everyone is Scottish football is fearful of a SMiSA clone. The beauty is it’s there for everyone to see and point to it being exactly what we’re not looking for. We also have Tynecastle and can use that too to highlight some stuff you’d like to emulate, steep pitch being the major one. I think highlighting St Mirren but overlooking Hearts is exactly the point I made in the previous post. Everyone has been very complimentary on our direction of travel, do we seriously think there’s a chance of the former over the latter? For what it’s worth Flow was very mindful when in post and was enamoured by Aalesund’s ground. A masterplan was commissioned during his tenure and it came back with a Ravenscraig oval bowl. That is the best I could describe it when I got a five second glimpse.

Dealing with corporate bodies in my experience is a lot easier and less emotive than any residents association, a newly formed community action group by Karen’s and all the NIMBY’s wanting their tuppence worth. Debates like these we point to why we support or are anti something but few add in the alternative. For example, a £35m (plucked out of thin air before anyone holds me to it) stadium of course would have ongoing maintenance. Theres no building, garden or park that doesn’t. A new stadium is a bit like a new car, you get an MOT holiday of three years due to it being new. A new stadium would have snagging of course but with good design and keeping on top of things, free of major bills for at least 20 years off the back of it. The issue here is with Fir Park we’re dealing a site we first used in 1895. A combination of urban sprawl and successive upgrades due to us never being overly flush (Ian St John allowed for the POD, POD funded the McLean), we’ve just tackled each project as best he could with the funds available. For the first time in the clubs history we’re in a position to actually make a strategic decision and have the means to do it/see it through.

Something like a stadium move isn’t one for an executive board of a fan owned club alone, how can it be? It’s just as pivotal if not more so than a chancer trying to get control for the cost of two empty ginger bottles. Where we’ll be playing football in ten years time will fully determine the direction and potential fortunes of this club for the rest of its existence. We’re sitting on over 18m euros in transfer income In three years, sell JT as expected and we’re up over €20m. It’s unprecedented and truly transformational. I’d flip the question round. Those reluctant to move, at what point do our coffers have to be swelled to before you get on board?

Following on from that table I posted on P&B, if we were to now get €6m for JT and Fadinger, those two sales and the running total, that would raise the question for me to now be "why the fuck are we staying at FP?".

If its a yacht then you could finance a new stadium. If it's an internal cabin on a cruise ship then enjoy your cocktails.

I think there is also a willful oversight that hospitality spends are on the increase and patrons demand a certain experience to justify that expense. What we offer is not amazing in 2026, by 2046 it will be archaic without looking at our target audience and adjusting our offering. Fixing FP is just sticky plaster-ing the problem. If we take the projected £8m and £5m I outlined above as the top end of our spend would it not make more sense to put that into something new, bespoke and itself OK for 30 years before any major upgrade works? It's a strange one that we don't look to secure our club's future in the same we do in our own lives. I suspect very few of us live in the same place we did after moving out of our parents home. Transitioning from renting in some cases or buying and taking on debt beyond our current income but manageable because the debt is designed to allow us to progress. We do it because we aspire to more and get our foot on the ladder. As we transition through life we upgrade often to a family home and/or to something that reflects our income and lifestyle aspirations. I suspect the vast majority on here have taken out a mortgage with no guarantees on continued employment or security, but for Motherwell to do it is a step too far?

I and others have tried to illustrate that a new stadium offers significant revenue boosts to cover the cost. Staying at FP isn't doing up the 60 year old POD, as soon as that's done it's addressing the 33 year old McLean (roof and seats) then onto the Hunter which is essentially a terrancing shed with a 60? year old structure and roof. By the time that is all done the Cooper will need work. Fir Park very much is the Forth Bridge, by the time you finish painting it, you start again. I'd venture that by revamping the POD, the associated loss in premium revenues, the upheaval, the temporary fixes to allow us to continue hosting games, then fixing the McLean and the Hunter in turn, we're easily looking at £5m beyond the cost of the POD replacement which I still contend will be a nightmare in planning and consultant/architect/lawyers fees.

I'm in favour of summer football for most of the reasons you outline. There are a few things I don't know and maybe wouldn't know without further digging and the actual implementation of it. First, how would a March till December league work with the practicality of transfers? We get a mid season window here for a month but imagine one is 3.5 months long which could affect cohesion and momentum. Would we struggle to attract players for three months till mid-December on late August deadline day? Maybe they'd be thrilled at Xmas off and January in Dubai but they also could not be happy at 17 months straight football and no summer holiday, how many League One players would want to join us in mid-May with 50 games already under their belt from August the previous year. Our preseason business would limited to one month only and at a time when the pickings are slimmer than in the summer, from the start of February you can't affect things in any meaningful until mid May. I guess with a number of Northern European leagues already dealing with these there are answers to a lot of this. We're pretty unique in the Uk for a Northern European country that we can't wait to get abroad when we have the best chance of good weather at home. In Scandinavia it's nowhere near the same culture, while not universal they tend to vacation more on shoulders of summer and deep winter. So attendances and revenue may be hit here. Could the shortfall be made up by a better TV deal with Sky and the SPFL having zero competition for UK audiences for 3.5 months every second year. In the year we transition, mid May league finishes .... what do we do until March the following year? There would have to be some sort of mini tournament to keep those teams in Europe ticking over. In WC and Euro years to use this summer as an example, the Scotland squad reported a few days after the final games and were released three weeks ago. Raskin a fortnight ago, when do we go back to a full schedule, FIFA/UEFA have blackouts and player burnout would have to be considered. However, I think the upgrading FP/Move thread has shown, there's a strong reticence to change and breaking the habit of winter attendance, what has always been known/a thing. I'd suggest the majority of Scottish football fans will operate with a hierarchy of how does it affect me, my club, national team, wider society ... all in that order. Beyond that, Scottish football decision makers and administrators have shown it is full of silo builders and the epitome of parochialism. We can't even agree a consensus on colt teams in lower leagues, reserve and U21 football or anything else for kids development that comes from a Henry McLeish report commissioned after a Scotland failure and national moratorium. With so many +65 guys called Hughie in blazers in almost every Scottish football club there is zero chance we can get the numbers required even if presented with a business case that is a slam dunk change and our fortunes. "Wee Ne'erday dram, down the Ex Serviceman's, OF match, up the road for steak pie. No way I'm not giving that up"

Roof and lower tier seats in McLean probably a more pressing issue but your point is on the money … literally.

One did who lived a street away from those who were contacted as they backed onto the road that takes people into the complex (and importantly) into the hotel. Ultimate NIMBY with pretty wild claims and tenuous links. I think supermarket chains buying up ground for town centre access was a very 90's phenomenon. In reality the cost to demolish and dispose of the FP site, I'm not sure there would be multiple millions left in the pot, looking at the housing estate(s) on the old college site, you're looking at 70 to 100 homes if following the same density. I also think the astro would have to be gifted to Knowetop to grease the council wheels. Certainly would get massive majority of local support from current residents. Anything we do at Fir Park would be bound up in the weeds for years with planning and residents groups. Remember they kicked off about a 5G add on to the floodlights. Let's not overlook the proposed training facility in Muirhouse was shelved because some residents Trojan Horsed the Bullfrog pub team as a reason not to build two pitches and a academy base. Talk about not getting it would raise up the neighbourhood. In the 90's Chapman and Dickie rightly exploited the OF, by doing so they gave us a lopsided stadium. I've seen people advocating that the top tier should be removed to bring it in line with the rest of FP without realising that in the 30 years we've had the South/McLean that 2nd tier has earned the club well in excess of an extra £8m over a single tier (2,400) stand even when adjusted for inflation and VAT taken off. For me the best solution to to continue to exploit the green and blue pound and get their glory hunters to unwittingly finance any new stadium. Take a current OF game as the datum. Match it and we go along with same income as we already achieve. Everything above it is for want of a better word, 'gravy'. All final values in brackets are a conservative amount we could realise over th 20 year lifespan of a mortgage: £5m down from player sales in summer 2025 and summer 2026. A rule of thumb is 1,000 seats x 3.5 games a season x 20 years x £24 (£30 average seat price for cat A - 20% VAT) = £1.7m. It's safe to say a £33 adult ticket in 2026 will be closer to £50 in 2046 so over the borrowing lifespan it's £2m. So 10,000 away capacity (£10m) Assume we maintain our standard 5.5k home fans and look to grow that by 2k (some of that is already happening due to Jens bounce) there's £2-4m from home fans alone but I'd argue beyond 5.5k we're a more fickle bunch and anti-football like Alexander would greatly affect our home gate. (£3m) Hearts certainly for the next few years look as if they will exceed the current 4,800 of the South/McLean allocation and of course early round cup ties against any of those three. (£3m) Increased uptake of matchday and hospitality spaces, more hires during weekdays could see easily £500k to £1m a year, multiply up x20, it's £8-16m (with VAT taken off). (£10m) Ensure the building takes advantage of what it needs for matchdays and sweat those assets the other 340 days a year such as the main restaurant, coffee shop, kitchens. (£3m) Co-locate with the proposed training facility, £2-3m put funds into the wider stadium project/pitches we own. (£2m) Naming rights, reduction in maintenance costs, renting stadium to SPFL/SFA for cup ties, womens and U21/U18 games all add up over 20 years. £250k per year seem fair? (£4m) There would be servicing the debt of £35m of course. And any relegation upsets the apple cart for hopefully a season. Ambitious but all achievable, all that has things at £40m before you consider dropping in a million or two into the pot over the next 20 years when we make hay during a period of lucrative player sales as we are currently experiencing. Then you start looking at the costs for other things and see if you can justify them at the initial design phase, everything should be on the table, not limited by fears until the numbers are ran. All these are multi-million pound investments and considerations but if you can make a business case for it and project that the income generated exceeds the cost, then you introduce it to the design phase. Roof - Depends on material and complexity, acoustic baffling, mounted grow lights, maintenance costs of pitch. Roof benefits - no games postponed, 24-7/365 space, banquets, concerts, exhibitions, other sports, ceremonies, beer festivals, novelty/uniqueness. Removable Pitch - Either full or broken down and moved outside. Bring in a astroturf pitch, exhibition hall carpet

How did you guess ... let me have a go back .... Kevin Bridges?

I appreciate your reticence and there's a host of horror stories of a chairman's ego making a club homeless and a shiny new stadium hosting zero events and quickly turning into the set from the Last of Us (Darlington, Kassam Oxford). I think we are unique in our league that two teams suck up so much support from the glory hunting/perpetuating the religious bullshit among our population. That also takes competitiveness and money from communities around the country which they go on to complain about. To put it as simply as possible, for every 1,000 seats we make available to the OF multiplied how often we play them at home over two seasons being seven (six guaranteed and one normally post split, plus an odd cup tie) and an average ticket price £24 (£30 minus 20% VAT) over a 20 year mortgage is £1.7m before you factor inflation which would take it closer to £2m. Give the OF an extra 5,000 seats to add to the 4,800 they get already we've realised £10m in revenue. Not only that the stadium would benefit from an uplift in home support due to the novelty factor of it being new. McDiarmid Park makes something like £1.2m from non match day hospitality and function hire. It seems every funeral in Perth goes back there for their sausage rolls and cakes. Even if we realise half of that on top of what we currently pull in, that's massive. Matchday hospitality would go up two or threefold with a modern offering. You mention the office space, covid allowed for a lot more home working and while there's still a need for it, it's not as essential as it was before. However, you then have to make the office space you do have and what if offers unique and a reason to seek it out. Having an incubator space where small startups can feed off each other and cross pollinate seems to me to be something that would give you an edge over an empty box at the foot of Airbles Road. You tap into every resource and grant going, local and national and pan UK. You sell the NLC the residents around FP moaning less, you offer a solution to their concert hall conundrum and you offer an anchor project to stimulate the Ravenscraig site. For me to be truly unique you need to push the boat out yet always have doing it cost effectively at the heart of it. I'd have it only the second covered grass football pitch in the UK (Millenium Stadium), I'd have that pitch removable so the space can be used for all sorts of events. I'd specify agricultural/industrial design and materials but do it in a way that's it's celebrated. I'd make the site one large power generator, ground source bored hot water to solar and have it export energy. Of course each one of the makes the price increase due to their perceived complexity but if done right and properly researched it can be done for much less than some think.

Except I outlined how we can. Granted back of a fag pack maths but it points to how it is achievable in theory and we maintain our income and costs similar to what as they are at present. I posted a link to the 42 page presentation I made on P&B earlier. I don't know if you reviewed it then but here it is: Our Future Home Presentation

The issue is we’re in a dense residential area and the residents are already inconvenienced upwards of 23x a season. The NIMBY brigade would be mobilised and in full swing. The delay due to public consultations etc and reworks of the plans would sap money and enthusiasm. Also, with all that in mind the footprint and height of any new building would probably have to conform to that of the existing stand. Hearts main stand almost doubled theirs by coming forward into that pedestrian plaza they created. Theres a very good spot by StAndrew7 over on P&B on costs from a professional point of view. The issue we have is most of our internal spaces within the POD are pretty narrow, think of the 91 suite. Even the Centenary isn’t a big space in hospitality terms. We’ll always be limited at FP but not as limited as St Mirren are limiting their capacity to 8,000, that was madness in our league. I do agree the multiple agencies involved in Ravenscraig would be a nightmare but a lot easier to deal with than a residents association leaning on councillors. The patrons of the Bullfrog got a pretty nice improvement in their two blaise pitches kyboshed. I’d actually halt the proposals for Dalziel Park and look to pump that spend into something at Ravenscraig to make it a campus and share the facilities for training and matchdays. The additional issue with Ravenscraig is that it’s 20 years behind where it should be. A lot of people staked their reputation on it being a success. Maybe back then a stadium would have been seen as a catalyst and anchor to stimulate redevelopment. Today I’d be m sure due to a lot of water passing under the bridge, projected revenues not realised and money leaching out, the required land would come with a price tag that makes it very tricky even with £10m in the bank.

I'm unsure what these reports give you in 2026. Now all anyone needs to do is visit their preferred AI engine, upload a number of background documents that give it context (our past five years of accounts, NLC development strategy, Ravenscraig masterplan, half a dozen news articles, stadium precedent studies, and a plethora of others) and it will spit something decent out, with graphs, projections and looking very professional. What you're paying for with a consultancy is their name and clout added to it. Five years ago perhaps the fee could paid be justified and information contained would be pertinent because it would have needed true analysis and human endeavour. Let's not overlook that in a subjective document that is open to so much interpretation and presumption, that any inference can be made to suit a narrative and most importantly sell a vision to the fanbase. The events of two summers ago shows that a significant part of our fanbase have no interest in getting close to any weeds let alone get in amongst them. I asked a question at the AGM ..... roughly went along the lines of due to the success of the team, we are looking at potentially realising a high seven-figure, possibly eight-figures of transfer revenue this summer. Does that change the thinking and direction of the board as to what we do next? Of course the answer was vague, obtuse and as secretive as we've came to expect of late. On the face of it, staying and redeveloping seems the simplest option, even if it means a season or two of disruption and hit to income. However, due to the transfer receipts we're likely to realise, we're now potentially discussing projects that were previously beyond us. We've effectively gone from talking about financing a new POD to having the sort of deposit that allows you to seriously consider a mortgage on a new stadium. Personally, I'd prefer the latter as Fir Park will always be limiting to any aspirations, for a host of reasons although I suspect the equalisation of season ticket prices across the three home stands points towards the first part of the club ultimately remaining at Fir Park and mitigating moving punters to other stands. However, you may want to look at it as Elijah Just and Lennon Miller effectively paying for two behind the goal stands, with Watt and Ward covering the training complex. That still allows JT's eventual income to go back into the football department. One thing is certain, if we redevelop FP or embark on something new, if we go less than a 13,000 capacity of which 5,000 is accessible to away fans, then we can't maintain our current financial planning and projected incomes. That is, unless our home support grows to a regular 7-7,500. As I outlined in the presentation @Kmcalpin covered way back, if for example we increase our capacity in a new stadium to 16,000 and give up those extra 3,000 to the OF/Hearts, over a 20 year mortgage we'd earn close to £8m just for those extra 3,000 seats from what FP currently holds. 3,000 extra seats allows us to maintain our current business model and pay off another stand. Increase to 19,000 capacity, it's all covered if done modestly, the trade off is hosting the ugly sisters means there is an 11,000 to 7,000 imbalance when we are the home team, but those extra 6,000 with their green and blue pounds buy us a fair bit of a stadium for 'free'. Things get tricky if we are relegated and don't bounce back up, but as we enter our 44th? season in the top flight then. Just trying to simply the above to make the concept sink in. There would be of course groundworks, new 5% plastic pitch, professional fees, contingencies and cost overruns all projects have attached. For me it's simple. Make the space(s) multi-use and able to be used 24-7/365 and monetise it, make it a destination venue in Scottish football, offer something truly unique and lower our current maintenance costs. Good design can enhance atmosphere which is a big reason people are wary of moves along with debt saddled to the club. An innovative approach at conception can address all of these fears.

And that in one statement highlights the glass ceiling (pun not intended) many of our own fans put in place often artificially. The guy is saying weekly he wants the players to be the best they can be, exceed their what they assume is their own personal limitations and we’re seeing that played out. But yeah, with this, the bare minimum will suffice …. All I’ve said since my first post on the subject is it could be so much more with little effort or cost. Just my observation.

Quit being so salty. Having an opinion on something is not reliant on experience or first hand involvement. If you do, it adds a degree of qualification and others can weigh up how much they weight they give your opinion. However, an odd bloody argument on a football forum. By extension, anyone who hasn’t played at least semi-pro level just shut up about Jens, his tactics and our players. The relationship between the spaces and the flow is the issue for me. It seems cramped. It could be so much more with some more thought and rejigging. We are at the public consultation phase after all and this is the time as members of the public to give our two cents. Unsure why it’s triggered you to the degree it has. I and a few others came up with a rough costing for the facility with slightly different methods, but a rule of thumb is £2k per square meter is a workable benchmark. So aye, it’s infinitely better than what we have at present but as it stands, to me, looks like Stalag Fußball.

I’m talking about the space being usable, at present I’m not sure the design offers the best chance of that. But don’t let my observations get in the way of your hyperbole. Build cheap, build twice.