Ground sharing in England between football clubs is relatively unheard of, but between a football club and rugby side is becoming more common. The biggest success story of this is that of Adams Park, where Wycombe Wanderers and London Wasps have shared the ground from 2002 up as recent as December last year. However, is ground sharing right for everybody?
A number of grounds across England feature both rugby and football with different effects. In August 1998, the Madejski stadium in Reading was opened, with its aim to host both top flight football and rugby for Reading F.C and London Irish R.F.C. It was built for this connection between the two clubs in mind, and is still going strong to this day with both clubs using it as their home stadium. With a capacity of over 24,000, it’s a great venue, one of which both clubs can be proud of. It is a positive move for the football club, a newer and better facilitated stadium than their previous Elm Park. Obviously with a new stadium, some fans cannot accept change, but the majority here agree it’s a move for the better, or is it? Despite the good connections between the clubs there have been confrontations. In the past, Reading have demanded to the RFU that London Irish’s games be called off or rearranged due to an important football fixture coming up, in order to maintain the quality of the pitch for football purposes. Notably, this is usually accepted but it’s far from ideal.
Edgley Park in Stockport is another example. Stockport Country, now of the Conference North, and Sale Sharks of the Aviva Premiership share this ground. The football club have been using the stadium since 1902, but in recent years following their demise from the football league, finances have become a struggle. The advantage for them is the success of the Rugby. With Sale paying towards rent and upgrading facilities, it has helped the struggling football side when times have been tough. Despite this, the biggest concern to the football club is that Sale plays their home games on a Friday night, giving the ground staff 18 hours to prepare the pitch for the following 3pm. This includes remarking, removing the rugby posts and erecting the football goals, rolling the pitch and even re-branding due to the advertising.
London Welsh began their illustrious ground sharing adventure at QPR’s home ground Loftus Road in West London. It was a success, but in 2002 they moved to Wycombe, some 30 miles away. Despite the location, the move was good, for Wycombe Wanderers and Wasps. Little conflict arose and soon positive talks began, such as plans for the Wycombe Air Park, a new and innovative 17,000 seater stadium. Like the Madejski, it was planned in the benefit of both clubs and things were looking likely until in April 2013 when Derek Richardson became principal shareholder of Wasps, with his objective ultimately not to ground share, but to have their own stadium in the future. Relations after this broke down, and after a 12 year success story, Wasps moved again, but this time a further 80 miles away from their origins to Coventry City’s Ricoh Arena.
So is ground sharing a good idea? It can be beneficial as in the case of low league Stockport County financially, but the main concern to football fans is simply the result of the pitch. Fans of these football clubs constantly complain about their facilities being ruined by the opposing sport, but if there is a contribution to the ground owners, who is going to stop it?
Thank you for reading. Please take a moment to follow me on twitter –@LWOSdale89. Support LWOS by following us on Twitter – @LastWordOnSport and @LWOSworld – and “liking” our Facebook page.
Have you tuned into Last Word On Sports Radio? LWOS is pleased to bring you 24/7 sports radio to your PC, laptop, tablet or smartphone. What are you waiting for?
Feel free to discuss this and other footy related articles with thousands at r/football.
