Newcastle United’s hierarchy have dropped the strongest hint yet that a move away from historic St James’ Park could be imminent after revealing a new stadium could “double” revenue.
The club’s long-running and forensic feasibility study, which has now passed the year mark, is in its second and final part after identifying risks around staying at St James’ Park.
Newcastle insist no final decision has been taken but i understands there are plans to talk with key stakeholders, including transport operators Nexus and the city council, in the New Year ahead of revealing the final options being considered.
But in a revealing intervention at an event at Newcastle’s STACK fanzone, chief operating officer (COO) Brad Miller said the club were “seriously” looking at relocating to another site not far away from St James’ Park. That possibility, he revealed, would come with the option of adding “many more seats”.
It is the most forthright admission yet that a new stadium is on the agenda and also reflective of the narrative around the project. While Newcastle’s official survey, commissioned by CAA last year, recorded 71 per cent of the fans polled wanted to stay it feels like momentum is now behind moving – if the circumstances are right.
There are a few reasons for this. The first, which the club alluded to on Wednesday night, is that with Profitability and Sustainability Regulations (PSR) so suffocating they need to make the stadium “sweat”.
Whatever they do with St James’ Park the revenue possibility will never match a custom-built facility that would have an expanded corporate offer along with facilities to host gigs, NFL games and high-profile boxing events.
Whether PSR or its successor – “squad cost controls” – exist in their current form or not, Newcastle’s need for greater revenue to rival more established clubs will remain. Frustrated fans now understand that better than ever, which has shifted the dial on the stadium debate.
Another compelling factor is the sheer number of supporters currently being locked out of games.
Newcastle implemented a membership scheme two years ago where fans pay an annual fee to gain access to a ballot for the few thousand tickets that go on general sale. But the odds of obtaining one aren’t great and that has increased the feeling among supporters that more seats are needed.
The prospect of a new generation of younger fans being kept out of St James’ Park has also been raised.
i also understands that stadium specialists who were contacted by the club in the early part of the feasibility study were uniform in their opinion that “bolting on” additional seats or adding piecemeal to St James’ Park would be costly and far from ideal in terms of aesthetics.
It’s understood that an interim solution of a small increase in capacity or patching up the stadium – one of the options looked at originally – have been ruled out in favour of much more ambitious options.
Here are the thoughts of Alex Thomas, a principal at HKS, the architects who designed the £4.8bn SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles, about Newcastle’s dilemma.
“There’s a big difference between taking an existing ground with all of its constraints and limitations and building something new,” he said.
“If we were going to build a new stadium for Newcastle we would do it so differently to how the existing structure is. You’re always going to be compromised trying to bolt on to the back of another structure that’s already been bolted onto three times.
“It is often more expensive per square metre because you’re trying to perform surgery on this complicated, compromised thing whereas a new build, per square metre, is much, much better value for money.
“Objectively you end up with a better project but that’s without getting into the emotions of it, having the centre circle where it has been for centuries and the ties supporters have.
“A lot of clubs have gone through that emotional journey and it’s difficult. But when the new place turns out to be really great, people do think differently – their new seat might be amazing, there’s new technology there, there’s possibilities.
“It would need to be a night and day difference at Newcastle but you could build in some of the club DNA from the old ground. There’s ways of making the values of the club and the iconic nature of St James’ Park and its architecture part of the experience of a new ground.”
That does not feel a million miles away from what Miller said on Wednesday night in front of supporters as he outlined the two dualling options in front of Newcastle.
“The first choice is, if we stayed at St James’, we have the 52,000 seats already,” he said.
“It comes with significantly more money if we transform it and it will look amazing. That’s option one.
“Option two is if we were to move away, and not too far away as we aren’t going to stretch the elastic band to the point of breaking.
“The second option, we are looking at it seriously as it does have the potential to earn more than twice as much in terms of revenue, compared to a transformation of St James’ Park. And more seats, a lot more seats potentially.”
The devil will be in the detail, you suspect. A new build that looks fantastic and is located in the city centre could, in time, convince even those who believe St James’ Park is still the best option.
If Plan B is housed outside of the city centre – the current Newcastle Racecourse site in Gosforth has been mentioned as a possible option – the club may fail to carry the majority. The city centre site is what makes Newcastle’s stadium unique.
It certainly feels as though the messaging around the issue has changed of late. Insiders have also emphasised to i that the moving option is on the table but the messaging feels like it has changed since Miller, who joined in the summer, joined the club to lead the project.
“We have taken the opportunity to look at ‘what will a new stadium look like?’,” he said on Wednesday.
“It’s not comparing apples with apples, they are not like for like. It’s comparing apples with pears.
“The brilliant thing about St James’ is it is an iconic location, the atmosphere and the competitive edge it gives the team on the pitch – and it has 52,000 seats already.
“A new stadium doesn’t have that, and we’d have to pay for all those seats again. But a new stadium has the potential to earn a lot more, both on match days, and non-match days.
“It is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. So, everything we are doing, do we invest and transform St James’ as we see it today on site where we are? Or do we take that bold move and think about moving?”
The club say they will consult with fans and supporter groups when they reveal the next steps of the project early in 2025.
“We want to make sure it is a very robust process,” Miller says.
“So, regardless of the outcome, I want to stand up in front of everybody through the process and say: This is why it is a logical decision.”
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