{"id":297382,"date":"2023-11-24T16:24:40","date_gmt":"2023-11-24T16:24:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportslifetale.com\/?p=297382"},"modified":"2023-11-24T16:24:40","modified_gmt":"2023-11-24T16:24:40","slug":"inside-evertons-new-550m-stadium-with-tour-of-the-incredible-views","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportslifetale.com\/soccer\/inside-evertons-new-550m-stadium-with-tour-of-the-incredible-views\/","title":{"rendered":"Inside Everton's new \u00a3550m stadium with tour of the incredible views"},"content":{"rendered":"
A bitter north wind whipped through the old Liverpool docks, a mile as the crow flies from Goodison Park, and the sky was slate grey, just like the mood around the club who have been docked ten points and now await whatever storms may follow.<\/p>\n
But the scene behind the vast granite wall where Everton\u2019s new stadium is being built was one of utter incongruity, given the state of crisis the club find themselves in.<\/p>\n
There were 1,100 people on site on Wednesday at the club\u2019s new Bramley Moore Dock Stadium – where tasks completed this week have included the lowering into place of the concrete blocks which will form the players\u2019 tunnel, the application of finishing touches to the vast glazed frontage and the erection of the huge lighting columns which will illuminate the fan park in the lee of that main entrance.<\/p>\n
The gradient of the stands, some of which are already fitted with blue seats, is as steep as is legally permissible, with steel and glass structures at the top of each to project back the noise. The architect, Dan Meis, promised from day one a far steeper gradient, or \u2018rake\u2019, than the Emirates or West Ham\u2019s London Stadium. It looks like he\u2019s been as good as his word.<\/p>\n
MailSport\u2019s tour on Wednesday took us to one of the spots, on the second floor, where supporters will catch sight of the pitch before taking their seats. The breath-taking view of the steep-sided stands \u2013 with a flag poking out of the mud at the point where the centre circle will be painted – suggested that the spirit of the old Goodison Park cauldron will be alive and well.<\/p>\n
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Mail Sport were given a tour of Everton’s new Bramley Moore Dock Stadium on Wednesday<\/p>\n
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The ground – which will house 53,000 supporters – has the steepest legally-permitted stands<\/p>\n
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The \u00a3550m stadium will become the sixth largest in the Premier League and it is hoped that work will be completed a year from now ahead of three test events in early months of 2025<\/p>\n
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The setting, on the banks of the Mersey, also marks the place out from all other new stadiums of the Premier League era. From the Western Terrace, a vantage point to watch the team buses, fans will look out across the River Mersey. From the panoramic bar area in the Southern Stand concourse, there will be views across Nelson Dock, back to the Liver Building. A night game at the stadium, illuminated by light, really will be something else.<\/p>\n
But while the industry continued, flat out, to ensure completion a year from now – ahead of at least three test events in the early months of 2025 and Everton\u2019s arrival for the following season – there was no disguising the deep uncertainty beyond that lay beyond the Victorian turrets of the granite wall.<\/p>\n
The ten-point deduction was quite clearly something Everton did not see coming. Some insiders within the club hierarchy have this week remarked on their colleagues looking so visibly low. For two years, the new stadium, visible from Everton\u2019s seventh floor offices at the Liver Building as it rose from a derelict dock, had seemed to offer a vision of hope.<\/p>\n
The mood in the blue half of city this week suggests that collective indignation over the proportionality of the punishment may help power the club from the position, second bottom of the Premier League, to which they\u2019ve been sunk.<\/p>\n
The resolve certainly salved the gloom at the Winslow Hotel on Goodison Road, where supporters are encouraged inside by the painting of Dixie Dean, match ball in hand, on the pub\u2019s sign. It was there that around 70 people gathered, on Wednesday night, for a meeting of various fan groups. They are planning a campaign which will include the distribution of up to 38,000 pink cards emblazoned with the Premier League logo and the word \u2018corrupt\u2019, before Sunday\u2019s match against Manchester United.<\/p>\n
\u2018Welcome aboard, everybody, to the biggest fight I believe Everton Football Club will have had in its 145-year history,\u2019 said Dave Kelly, chair of the Everton fans\u2019 forum, as he got the meeting under way.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u2018The Premier League have taken the wrong club on \u2013 in the wrong city,\u2019 insisted Kelly, telling the meeting that Sky Sports had assured him they will not turn down the volume on any abusive language \u2013 including planned anti-Premier League chants – on Sunday. He said: \u2018They won\u2019t be turning the audio down [or] editing it like we have got a pre-season friendly going on at Goodison. I think they\u2019re probably as keen as we are that Goodison is a bear pit.\u2019<\/p>\n
To Kelly and others, it is vital now that fans\u2019 voices are heard in the club\u2019s appeal. Kelly, a veteran of the fans\u2019 fight against the unpopular and ultimately abortive ground move to Kirkby, is urging Everton to allow them to make a submission.<\/p>\n
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Tasks completed this week included the lowering into place of the concrete blocks which will form the players\u2019 tunnel, finishing touches to the frontage and the erection of lighting columns<\/p>\n
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There were 1,100 people on site where Mail Sport visited the ground on Wednesday<\/p>\n
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This will be where some fans walk out to see the pitch and go to their seats when Everton make the move to Bramley Moore Dock from Goodison Park<\/p>\n
\u2018Why weren\u2019t fans allowed to make a contribution [originally]?\u2019 he said, after the meeting. \u2018We\u2019ve been shouting from the rooftops for years that the club hasn\u2019t been run correctly. We\u2019ve now asked the club that when their appeal goes, they put in an application for the fans to make their own submission – and if required, to attend an appeal hearing in person.\u2019<\/p>\n
The Winslow is a pub where one of Everton\u2019s 1939 league champions, Norman Greenhalgh, was once landlord. That 1939 team, including Joe Mercer and Tommy Lawton, was stopped in its prime by the outbreak of war, just as had happened in 1914. When probably the club\u2019s greatest team secured qualification for the European Cup in 1985, the Heysel Disaster brought a five-year ban from continental competition. And now, as a stadium to grace the Premier League takes shape, this. \u2018Evertonians and their hard-luck stories!\u2019 winces one fan.<\/p>\n
There is certainly realism in fans\u2019 arguments. These people are not blind to the way the club has been mismanaged. \u2018We broke a rule. We know we have,\u2019 said Katie Carter, a driving force behind the 1878s group which has already raised \u00a340,000 to pay for eight protest banners, which will be prominent on Sunday. \u2018We are not going to stand here and play the victim but the punishment doesn\u2019t fit the crime.\u2019<\/p>\n
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The setting on the banks of the Mersey marks the place out from other new stadiums of the Premier League era<\/p>\n
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A night game at the stadium, illuminated by light, will provide some stunning views<\/p>\n
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The spirit of the Goodison Park cauldron looks like it will be truly alive at their new home<\/p>\n
Some supporters found themselves under attack for protesting against Bill Kenwright and Farhad Moshiri, as catastrophic spending and mismanagement drove the club into a second successive relegation fight and a losing battle with the league sustainability rules. But it was the same fans at the Winslow on Wednesday – demonstrating that those maligned last year had the club\u2019s interests at heart.<\/p>\n
The question, of course, is whether their protests can influence what happens next. There is certainly realism in fans\u2019 arguments. These people are not blind to the way the club has been mismanaged. \u2018We broke a rule. We know we have,\u2019 said Katie Carter, a driving force behind the 1878s group which has already raised \u00a340,000 to pay for eight protest banners which will be prominent on Sunday. \u2018We are not going to stand here and play the victim but the punishment doesn\u2019t fit the crime.\u2019<\/p>\n
Everton are unlikely to ask the Premier League for a full acquittal. Rather, their appeal seems likely to focus on the league\u2019s unwillingness to account for several mitigating factors \u2013 including the need to make interest payments on loans taken out to build that new stadium.<\/p>\n
The club\u2019s proportionality case may be helped by the fact that the Premier League sustainability rules do not even detail any formula to be applied if a club is in breach. There is no precedent. Everton are the first to be docked point in this way.<\/p>\n
But even if the ten-point deduction were to be reduced to three, it would not prevent last season\u2019s three relegated Premier League sides, Leicester City, Leeds United and Southampton, mounting legal cases against Everton. (A three-point deduction would not have relegated them in the 2021\/22 season.)<\/p>\n
As of last night, Everton had received no indication of any club\u2019s plans to sue. But even if none is forthcoming, there are also the grave risks attached to American investment firm 777 buying the club from Moshiri, having already loaned Everton money. The investigative new outlet Josimar reported this week that one of several clubs under 777\u2019s ownership \u2013 Genoa – is at risk of bankruptcy, with creditors owner \u00a3160million.<\/p>\n
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The Toffees have recently been hit with a ten-point deduction for breaching financial rules<\/p>\n
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Fans vow to fight the Premier League following their points docking with protests set to take place before Sunday’s match with Manchester United at Goodison Park<\/p>\n
The commercial potential of the stadium at Bramley Moore Dock suggests that Everton do not need to be bailed out by an outfit such as this. That a credible buyer with pedigree must surely be out there, ready to buy Everton, a club literally building for the future. As of yet, there has been none.<\/p>\n
But if the 777 deal does not go ahead, he club risk falling into financial administration, with a further nine-point deduction. The genuine risk of that happening is part of the reason why the fight to have the ten-point deduction reduced, or replaced with a fine, is so important now.<\/p>\n
Three of the four phases of the new stadium\u2019s hospitality packages are already sold out. The number of hospitality \u2018covers\u2019 sold will increase from 1,500 to 5,000. The fan park area will become a general events space. The first of many expected new local hotels is being built to accommodate the numbers. So much lies just over the horizon, virtually within reach. And that, for Everton, has been the profoundest agony of all, this week.<\/p>\n
It’s All Kicking Off is an exciting new podcast from Mail Sport that promises a different take on Premier League football.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n It is available on MailOnline, Mail+, YouTube, Apple Music and Spotify.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n Your browser does not support iframes.<\/p>\n