Going to be hard to find fans for all the new seats in a new stadium if they sell all our best players.

Most money through player sales goes on the day to day running costs of the club, so even if the players were sold a good proportion would go to servicing existing debt. As Joey also says, who would come to watch a lesser team play?

Sell all our best players to have the best stadium in the Fizzy Drink League..........hmmm let me think about that.....

Is there no ridiculous idea that KEIOC will baulk at coming up with?

Jeez!

Exactly the policy of Southampton when they left their old home. What division are they struggling in now? Remind me...

I expect us to hit the ground running next season.

Stephen, the more success teams have, the more £millions you get. The more success you get the more bums on seats, ie kids growing up from the city. The more big players you have the more revenue from shirt sales etc.

That equals millons and millions of £ £s

Dave, was that post/article written by KEIOC?

I realise we have all been through the stadium debate over and over again.

I find the whole thing quite strange to be honest — we struggle to fill 40,000 seats and yet automatically believe we would fill 50,000 in a new stadium?

Most of us love Goodison — in my mind the problem here is the number of obstructed views. I do not buy the hospitality propaganda sold by the club — we struggle to sell hospitality now and the seats that are not sold are perfectly good seats.

In my mind, we should look short term, either re-build the Park End or put another tier on to increse the capacity by circa 6,000. I would imagine the cost of this would be in the region of £10m and feel sure that suitable loans could be agreed to fund this given the increase in revenue. Also we should look unto the viability of making the Lower Bullens into boxes — there are too many obstructed views in this area and surely boxes could be put here at a loss of probably 2,000 seats.

Finally all other obstructed view seats for all games bar Man U, Liverpool, Chelsea and Arsenal should be given away to scheels or sold for £2 — get people in the habit of going — the current £1 reduction for obstructed views is ridiculous.

Mike Elbey, as much as I agree the reduction for obstructed views is negligable, there are a few other points I am afraid I disagree with.

It is not quite tru to say we struggle to fill 40,000 as we have a average gate of 36,000. That means for every game under that amount we are over by a maximum of 4,000. It wouldn’t be difficult to drag that figure down if we were significantly below 36,000 even in a single match as that would take several sell outs to claw back. Therefore, it is a given we would not regulary sell out 50,000. However, we would occasionally do so and it is proven that increased capacity does (if only for a few seasons initially) increase attendance.

Also, you have not accounted for the imperitive that is the improvements required to Goodison in order to keep it safe and fit for purpose. Sadly, those days are numbered without significant investment that many do not factor into their equations.

I am not sure about your estimation of circa £10m to put another tier on the Park End and that is before the cost of losing 2,000 seats for the hospitality in the Bullens Road, reducing obstructed views further to lose revenue and building those hospitality facilities. Even taking your very conservative £10m expansion we would increase seats by 4,000 but lose on hospitality you allege we cannot sell and reducing the price of obstructed view seats. Upshot, several dozen million £s for little or no greater return than the current position.

Last of all you propose in the matches that we do guarantee to sell out and can charge the highest premium for tickets that we give certain seats to schools or sell for a mere £2. Do you know how much the club would LOSE by this manouevre? Have you a grasp of business or commerce? Sorry to be so challenging but I am afraid I find your ’solution’ almost as absurd as Stephen Kenny’s original post.

Before I am lambasted for being a DK supporter willing to sell our soul for a Meccano Tescodrome, I was and remain dead against that. I do not have the answers beyond trusting that our board and LCC have had a suitable scare to make sufficient effort to rehome us or improve us but we simply cannot afford to lose any more assets than we have so far.

I’d sell the entire squad for a rebuilt Goodison. I would have a target of being 17th for a few seasons.

We’ve won nothing the last 15 years, so we’ve wasted 15 years.

For me we should just think about one stand at a time.
Just concentrate on the Park End and forget everything else.

Fellaini had a very good run of about 8 or 9 games before his injury... hardly makes him worth £30-35mill.

Lee,

1. Don't quite understand your second paragraph. We DO struggle to sell 40,000 seats FACT. For the recent Man U game there were still tickets available at kick off. Chelsea was NOT a sell out, neither was Arsenal on the first game of the season. The ONLY game that is generally sold out in advance is the derby and possibly the Christmas bank holiday fixture. So I reitterate, we DO struggle to fill our current stadium.

2. I agree that I have no idea of what improvements are likely to be required to the stadium in order for it to continue to attain a safety certificate. However do you know whether any improvements need to be made and if so what the implications are. The point of my piece was to comment constructively on what I know / believe.

3. Your paragraph 4 — my £10m is an ad hoc estimate given experience of other developments — this is an initial discussion for gods sake or do you want me to go of and do some formal estimates. I believe it to be a realistic estimate, others with more knowledge may wish to comment. Also Its not an alegation that we do not sell the current hospitality its a FACT. If you go to the game have a look at the additional rows of seats put into the bottom of the main stand by the Park End, these are hospitality seats — they are seldom filled and these are good seats. Also what hospitality would we lose by increasing the capacity of the Park End? I do accept that the suggestion on the Bullens Road is a bit random and would need to be looked at but I believe it is worth some investigation. That does not mean that I believe it to be some sort of magic solution.

4. I accept that in the there would be the risk of losing some money in making obstructed views a negligable cost. However having left the prices the same for the 4 games I mentioned I wouold suggest you are only looking at a potential risk maybe 3-4 games (Man City, Spurs, Villa). Include these games also if you want. My point is that for in the region of 10 games a season we have 3000 obstructed views empty — surely we would be better to fill them than have them empty — any value that comes in is more than zero if the seats are empty — surely your obviosly extremely advanced grasp of business and commerce can see that.

Finally, this is a discussion forum. I stated my thoughts on what we could do given the stadium situation we are in now. My suggestions would increase the capacity by circa 4-5000, reduce obstructed views and increase hospitality. I believe this could be done and an accurate costing could be done to ascertain its viability. Hopefully i have treated your piece with a litle more respect than you teated mine....

Mike Elbey I agree with a lot of what you say. Upgrade Goodison where we can but lets not lose the character of the place completely.

Surveys have shown that a trip to Goodison is a favourite visit for a lot of away fans precisely because the place has a bit of character compared to the soul less bowls that other clubs are building.

It might take a while for what we have to be fully appreciated by all but I think back to the 70’s and the sacrilegious "updating" of many Victorian pubs. Its only when its gone that its really appreciated.

So yes, I like the idea of the exec boxes in Lower Bullens. But how about a bit of lateral thinking regarding Upper Bullens. I would "develop" it as the Bullens Rd Heritage Stand. Sure update toilets and catering where possible but keep the iconic Leitch structure intact as far as is possible. Maybe it would even be appropriate to have it declared a listed building. A bit of imagination could I am sure further develop the "heritage" theme - decent quality but traditional football ground catering would be an obvious starter.

Lee, you’ve been sold on Wyness’s lies that Goodison is unsafe. This was completely thrown out so you don’t need to worry about money keeping Goodison safe and fit for purpose. The health and safety lie was used to sell Kirkby to us.

Wow!! Talk about getting carried away.
£30-35m for Fellaini?

Mike Butler,

I totally agree with what you say about Goodison. We must look at what can be done short term to improve the facility but your idea regarding UB is extremely interesting.

Goodison may lack in certain areas but it is beyond comparrison in others. Let's make of it what we can and try and retain all its positives like tradition, atmosphere and also that fact that it is OUR HOME.

Mike Elbey - I would like to take some of the sting out of this between you & I as you clearly took my response as somewhat more nasty than it was intended (although re-reading it I can see why you were a little put out I still feel your swipes in reply could only serve to fan the flames) As such, I will try to challenge a little more softly.

1. 2008-2009: 35,408 (Premier League)
2007-2008: 36,955 (Premier League)
2006-2007: 36,739 (Premier League)
(source : footballgroundguide.com)

I go back to my assertion that in order to have that average a team must either consistently be at that level (we all know against the likes of Hull, Bolton, Portsmouth etc - no disrespect intended that is less likely than against Man U, Chelsea, Arsenal, etc.) Therefore, we must be over the average quite often in order to be averaging 90% of capacity. It is almost impossible to seel out a ground when considering seating groups of fans together as there will almost always be the odd space.

2. I know our previous Chief Executive alleged improvements were essential almost immediately and would be at great cost to merely keep the ground as it is. That said, I will accept I did not trust this man as far as I could throw his weighty body so I am willing to concede that I do not know this as fact, merely commonly held belief of which we have as yet had no correction announced.

3. Hold on. I thought you said you wanted facts!??? I base my opinion on figures announced by others such as proposals from KEIOC during the DK debacle and am more than willing to stand corrected but at no point did I say it was wrong. Merely that I was not sure about this figure. Please tell me why that deserves such a hysterical response as " this is an initial discussion for gods sake or do you want me to go of and do some formal estimates."

4. I accept this point wholly and clearly misunderstood your initial post that said you would reduce the cost for obstructed views barring the big games. My mistake for misreading it and I apologise.

Finally, my point about hospitality was that I do not understand why you want to increase a section of seating that you rightly state does not sell out. I do not question whether it sells out but why when you complain about it not doing so you want to lose 2,000 seats to accommodate it’s expansion.

This is meant to be a challenge of opinion and is not intended personally so I hopeyou take it in that fashion.

Lee, in order to keep any building fit for purpose be it brand new or a hundred years old or more you need to spend cash, think about your own house, if you don’t spend on it’s upkeep it falls to bits. The statement is true in that you have to spend to keep the building useable but you would in any not just GP. Older buildings tend to be built better and are certainly testimony to their engineers, look they are still there, most modern buildings have a design lifespan and an estimated date they will no longer be useable.

If we could get THAT money for Pienaar - a player with about 25 mins left on his contract? Yeah - we definitely should!! Then with that money, we could afford to pay him the increased wages his agent would dem....oh hold on, I...um...haven’t really thought this through.


Hrumph!

Firstly - Eugene - Peinaar actually has a nother 12 months plus on his contract, it expires at the of NEXT season.

Secondly. The main issue I see is that we need more executive / hospitality boxes. Portsmouths problem is they have none - this is where lots of matchday income is generally made.

I accept that we may not sell out a 50,000 ground every week, but we would sell more than 39,000 tickets on probably 5 or 6 times a season, so it would generally be worth while.

Why does everybody want to rebuild the Park End stand, I know this is the easiest, but it is also the newest and least falling down stand we have. To spend millions upgrading this and leaving the other 3 to deteriorate for another few seasons seems trather daft to me.

I also would never advocate selling your best players to build a stand, that’s what Villa did for many years - it got them a nice ground but not much on the pitch to watch. If you think 5th place and the odd cup run is bad, wait til you are sitting in your sparkly new Goodison Park, watching rubbish cos you have had to sell off the talent to pay for it!

Lee, I will not deny that your initial response rilled me somewhat - probably as a result of comments such as ’have you a grasp of business and commerce’ and ’your suggestion is absurd’ - they were both pretty derogatory comments in my view and as such you got an equally terse reply.

however I will accept your olive branch and return to a more reasoned discussion.

My general point is that we are constantly told by the club that 1. we need more capacity, 2. We need more hospitality and 3. We have not very much money. All I was suggesting was that there was a way of 1. increasing capacity and 2. increasing hospitality based on 3. at a reasonable cost, ie not £80m as per DK.

I do not believe we need a new stadium and I do not believe we need 50,000 capacity. I agree that there may be the odd game that we would achieve over 40,000 but i reitterate that we have only sold out twice this season - the derby and against burnley over Xmas. We did not sell out against Man U, Chelsea , Arsenal and as such I cannot agree that these would attract significantly bigger gates if we had a new stadium.

My reasoning for exploring the posibility of boxes in the LB was that boxes are a different sort of hospitality to the majority of what is on offer at Everton - I think we currently have 10 boxes - and it was something worth looking at. Also as mentioned above and despite my feelings we are constantly told that we need more hospitality by people in the club.

Finally I would repeat that my suggestion is merely that, a suggestion. But I would also say that the suggestion increases capacity, reduces obstructed views and increases hospitality - is that not worth a look at ?

To take the issues in order.

1. The laws of supply and demand:

You have to have success on the pitch to generate interest not just now but future generations too before building a stadium to hold non existant customers.

The RS were lucky to get 10000 in the old shed that was Anfield before Shankly and Arsenal had a massive waiting list for season tickets before building the Emirates.

So as some have already said it’s daft to break the squad up and end up in the Championship.

2. Goodison is not about to fall down or be closed down a FACT that has been published on these pages many times before.That was a myth put about by Kenwright/Wyness to get the vote for KIrkby.

3. The most cost effective and practical way to increase capacity AND prices!! is to develop GP over a period of time.

As suggested on these pages many times before by Tom Hughes (an experienced building engineer) and Trevor Skempton (a stadium architect who was involved In Newcastle’s stadium expansion) — both True Blues with experience in these matters, we could add a tier on the Park End with minimum disruption for about 15 to 20 million thereby increasing capacity by 8,000.

That would then give time to further increase demand and consequently funds to be able to develop Bullens and Gwladys Street in future phases.

4. We should not dismiss KEIOC’s thoughts on a Football Quarter... in fact, what better way to enjoy more outside investment than to ride on the back’s of the RS’s development and include bars and restaurants, hotel(s) etc on the Walton Lane side.

5. Furthermore, what better place to include a "National" football museum than GP which would attract funding from LCC? ... the football league? and many other societies.

I am sure there are many other thoughts that could be built on, something Kenwright and his cohorts should have been doing for the last 10 years... but as for selling the squad — that is something you do as a precursor to going bankrupt — just ask Pompey.

You guys who say we don’t fill up our stadium, are forgetting our away section which holds about 4,000, which is generous if you compare away allocations with other big clubs.

Typically at the Fulham home game for example, I could bring the Fulham fans up in my car!! Poor away support, I suggest does make up a fair proportion of unsold tickets.

So Everton do most of the time fill up the ’home’ allocation, even a large proportion of the restricted veiws.

Joey, we would not be selling all our best players we would be selling 3.

Gavin, £65m would pretty much clear our debt so would not be used to service existing debt, it could possibly help us renegotiate on better terms.

Tony, I honestly don't believe that the loss of these players would see us relegated. And if Moyes has one strength as a manager it’s finding quality players on the cheap to replace others (Lescott-Heitinga).

Dave, I haven't got any affiliation to KEIOC other than the odd donation and a desire to stay in the city.

Brian, as someone said later on in the thread it was also the policy of Aston Villa. How are they doing lately? Remind me.

Joey, we would not be selling all our best player’s we would be selling 3.

Gavin, £65m would pretty much clear our debt so would not be used to service existing debt, it could possibly help us renegotiate on better terms.

Tony, I honestly dont believe that the loss of these players would see us relegated. And if Moyes has one strength as a manager it’s finding quality players on the cheap to replace others(lescott-heitinga).

Dave, I havent got any affiliation to KEIOC other than the odd donation and a desire to stay in the city.

Brian, as someone said later on in the thread it was also the policy of Aston Villa. How are they doing lately? Remind me.

Colin, I agree except we have now been taken over by clubs such as Villa and Man city who will continue to invest in their squads until they are where the sky four currently sit. We need a long term plan to start generating funds. I honestly think we have missed the boat for finishing in the top four for the forseeable..

Ciaran, you are quite right I only mentioned these figures as they are what has been bandied about in the press. I’m not saying that is what we would get but if Lescott is worth £24m?

When I mention a stadium upgrade I’m not neccessarily talking about additional seats I’m talkin about NOT having to do chicken nuggets and chips in the car park. Taking back the rights to our catering and hospitality, expanding upon whats there and making it better. Proper executive boxes and everything else we are lacking. If the club think there is additional demand for seating then we would have the funds to do something about it.

Losing three players would not see us drop out of ther premier league and would not see a significant drop in attendances. The 35,000 that go most weeks have seen far worse Everton sides than this one even with out those players mentioned.

Stephen, I agree with thesis solely on a hypothetical basis.

Yes- it would be great to get that amount of money for those players.

Yes- you’re £65 million would go a long way to improving Goodison Park and, by extension, increase revenue.

Yes- Corporate facilities and commercial outlets are the main drawbacks of GP.

No chance- would I advocate the selling of those players under ANY circumstances.

Chris,

I was on my way from town to the chelsea game a few weeks back and I was early so I was just strolling through the streets up wessie road through county and up towards goodison(the spellow) an already it was electric. The I seen the ground out of nowhere with the massive badge on the side an I realised I didnt ever want to leave under any circumstances, I didnt want to lose everything thats been built over all those years to share with the shite or go on bestway/tesco’s car park or to melling or speke or anywhere else. Then I got in the ground with my mates, we got to our seats, Z cars came on and..... Well you probably know the rest. If selling a few players means we stay where we are it’s not as big a deal as some are making it out to be.

Stephen the trouble with part of that debt, the original Bear Stearns loan against future ticket sales is written in such a way as to have penalty clauses with early payment, not sure who in the end took it over as they went pop in the credit crunch but long term loans like these are home bankers for the lender as they are virtually guaranteed a good long term screw, the mortgages on GP are an easier one to sort but again would incur some penalty with early payment.

Corporates want to be associated with success, you won’t sell if you are an also ran.

Not sure about your valuations Stephen but it's not the worst idea I’ve heard, I’ve noticed a couple of people who were pro-Kirkby dismissing the idea claiming we’d be relegated

I wonder how they thought Kirkby was going to be funded.

Mike and Lee, well done, as one of you said, the site is a forum and open discussion on here without the usual abuse of fellow Evertonians is nice to see.

Jay, enjoyed your comments also, along with others.

Good read

Hey - here’s an idea - how about a "groundshare" with LFC (i.e. we BOTH play in the SAME ground but play alternate dates just like they do in Milan, Rome etc) ...?

Just a thought...

Stephen

I suppose it comes down to whether, for example, you would rather watch Everton beat Liverpool at the local park or your back garden than watch Liverpool beat Everton at Goodison. Tough one that.

I voted No to Kirkby by the way

How about we rename the street end the Kop End and put a Bill Shankly statue to Replace the Dixie Dean statue just as mad as that idea.

No man’s land is certainly where we are right now. There is a big decision to be made that has been dithered over for years:

1. Find a new site and build a large new stadium

2. Redevelop GP bit by bit and then eventually build a large new stadium on a new site - unless of cours space can be found on the present site.

Something i see that is missed in these debate is just how big Kirkby was going to be - 3-4 times the size of GP but only 12 000 more seats. Comparing the ground size of GP to any modern stadium is quite a shock - take a look in Google Earth sometime.

Building a few thousand new seats is great but fails to recognise the root of the problem - we need far more space to compete on an equal footing. That space is used to make everyone more comfortable which makes them more likely to attend and of course more likely to want to spend more money to attend.

There are plenty of middle class people who wouldn’t attend GP as it is now but who are interested in Premiership football. They can’t get into the grounds of our more successful neighbours as they are full - we have to offer them reasons to come to us. Football is no longer a working class sport.

Why spend money on developing GP if this cannot be achieved - good money after bad comes to mind. If we are going to do that then make damn sure we don’t have the spend the money all over again in 10-20 years time.

We have one of the highest proportions of lapsed season ticket holders (link) suggesting that there is a large population out there interested in Everton who could be persuaded to come more often if they were offered more for their money.

Chris,

In what way is what I’ve suggested anywhere near what you have said?

It seems to me most people accept that Goodison Park is limiting our ability to make enough to regularly compete at the top end of the Premier League?

It also appears that based on the last four transfer windows we have to sell to buy, indicating that there are no additional funds available?

What I’ve suggested is one way of changing this situation. By and large Arsene Wenger has done this at Arsenal. I cant see many others apart from taking on additional debt and Gavin has already mentioned what that is likely to do to our financial health. The original question remains. How do we fund a redevelopment of Goodison or a stadium move?

Look at Sunderland and Manchester City both have terrifc stadiums yet have been poor in the recent seasons. We need to build on the pitch first rather than focusing on events off it. Realistically Everton cannot aren’t going to get any more popular until we start getting better players and playing decent football. I agree to a cetain extent that it would give a chance for more corparate boxes but is there any waiting list for hospitality at Everton?. I’m sure at Manchester United or Chelsea you’d have to wait for ages to get a place in there.

I love GP like us all but it is only really a decent ground when it’s full and bouncing like Fiorentina or Liverpool and you really feel like you’re in a proper stadium. I feel stadiums need to be full each week to retain any character. I feel Stephen that it we could lose supporters rather than gain them if we sell our most talented players so then you’d have nobody to sit or stand in front of those new seats.

Teams come and go and form comes and goes - top class facilities are forever! They minimise the downtimes and maximise on the good times neither of which we can do now.

As mentioned - how is this achieved without decimating the first team? Getting a very rich corporate partner is one of the few realistic options - but there is always a price to pay. Public money is also a possibility but that increasingly requires the aforementioned involvement of the private sector - so bringing us back to the start of the discussion.

Compromises are going to have to be struck with the long term good in mind

Article is ridiculous as who is going to pay £30m - £35m for Fellani. The worth of the players mentioned is half that proposed, last year Man City paid crazy odds for Lescott , I just don’t see that happening again.

That aside, sell our best players so we can pay to redevelop Goodison and trust current board to do that. No thanks.

The old chesnut, is there any wait for corporate hospitality at Everton? Would you pay £99 for a plate of chicken and chips in the tent? can half the people who want a pie and a pint at half time even get one?


There are so many things we would need to do just to bring the stadium to a comparable standard to the majority of the rest of the league.

Those who are saying selling a few players means the fans would walk away look at Leeds. They went down on a few occasions, had to sell thier best players and their up and coming talent and still get 30 odd thousand, maybe their just better fans than us.

The arguments dont stack up Everton will still be here long after these players mentioned have gone and so will most of the match going Evertonians regardless of how well the team is doing!

Graham Atherton.

Obviously top class facilities are not forever otherwise you wuld all not be bitching about GP which was used for the world cup finals in 1966 and was the venue for our most productive period of trophies in the eighties.

Ask anyone about the Bayern Munich night if they want to see GP closed down.

I have a season ticket for the Park End (no better views in the Prem) but have also sat in the restricted views when I’ve had visitors and can understand the point about restricted views but these issue are nothing a makeover couldnt sort out.

GP is not about to fall down or be closed down despite the lack of spending on it for the last 20 years.

Selling the players would be a massive blow to morale though. We’d probably lose the manager, maybe some of the other players as well. I don’t see it as a viable option in practice, even though in theory I can understand your logic. I also think you overvalue the players I’m afraid, especially in the current market. Silly money only really gets spent by the Spanish big two at the moment and I don’t think they’re going to sign three Everton players. Transfer fees are as much about reputation as they are ability, and our lads don’t have them.

Having said that, if we could recruit whoever persuaded Barcelona to spend €70M + Samuel Eto’o on Zlatan Ibrahimovic then we can sell Phil Neville, Sylvain Distin and Victor Anichebe for the £65M. I’d do that.

I’ve changed over time and now very much believe we must stay at Goodison Park. I’d accept a new site in the city but with great regret. Goodison is special, its part of our identity, and most importantly, all but the very best new stadiums are shit.

When Goodison had a capacity of 65,000 which it did in 1964, when I went to my first match we didn’t get 65,000 for every match. The potential support for Everton is out there. Arsenal used to play in a stadium that was reduced over the years in capacity from 60,000 to 39,000.

The powers that be at Everton, made a very big mistake in not really developing Goodison between 1980 and 1994. Meanwhile the likes of Man Utd, were not standing still when it came to ground development. It is still possible to redevelop Goodison, but it is something that needs to be seen as a long term project say 10 - 15 years. Before anyone moans at that, Old Trafford as it stands has taken around that time to be redeveloped.