Brandywell Stadium Development

[Andy Bernard]

Not sure what Ballymena and Portadown's grounds are like but given the state of our ground we shouldn't be hosting anything. Shite PA, a third of a new stand, no media facilities and UEFA probably don't want an artificial surface

[rodgers]

I think you are right Andy. But Council seem unwilling to admit it as it wouldn't reflect well.

I have emailed one of the DCSDC councillors but no response. Elisha McCallion wrote back to me to say that she would contact the IFA and also said that they are working with the FAI and IFA to have Derry involved in the u21 Championships. She specifically mentioned Celtic Park as a possible venue.

[stevebradley]

I think you are right Andy. But Council seem unwilling to admit it as it wouldn't reflect well.

I have emailed one of the DCSDC councillors but no response. Elisha McCallion wrote back to me to say that she would contact the IFA and also said that they are working with the FAI and IFA to have Derry involved in the u21 Championships. She specifically mentioned Celtic Park as a possible venue.

Sinn Fein need to drop the pipe dream of using Celtic Park for the U21S Championships.

Even if Derry could get included as a venue, CP needs a tonne of work done to it to get it up to scratch. That money should be spent on improving a football stadium in Derry and creating a legacy for that sport - not spunked on fixing up a GAA ground that would then stay firmly out of bounds for 'soccer' events locally for the foreseeable future.

That said - I'm by no means convinced that SF are genuinely doing much about trying to get the U21s to Derry anyway.

[rodgers]

Sinn Fein need to drop the pipe dream of using Celtic Park for the U21S Championships.

Even if Derry could get included as a venue, CP needs a tonne of work done to it to get it up to scratch. That money should be spent on improving a football stadium in Derry and creating a legacy for that sport - not spunked on fixing up a GAA ground that would then stay firmly out of bounds for 'soccer' events locally for the foreseeable future.

That said - I'm by no means convinced that SF are genuinely doing much about trying to get the U21s to Derry anyway.

I agree. In fact I put all of these issues to her in my reply along with other issues and I have just received another reply that she has "been working with the GAA,FAI and IFA on all the issues that you have mentioned. We are working our way through various options and we would hope to settle on these over the coming months."

Again, I would be sceptical enough. However, it does seem to be an implicit admission that the Brandywell is nowhere near adequate despite having millions of pounds spent on it.

[marcoloco]

This just highlights how much Derry gets shafted. To not allocate a few games in the north west for a major Tournament is shameful. Again, if the games were allocated to Derry any upgrades could be delivered well in advance. Indirectly this is another own goal for SF. Delivering nothing locally whilst running around trumpeting our world class stadium and talking with the GAA about hosting future events despite us having to drive down to Magin Park for a whole season all becuase of the GAA's refusal to help us out. Sectarianism still rife within sporting institutions and government.

[Keyser Soze]

Do we know for a fact that these tournaments would accept 4G surfaces?

It could be something as simple as that, that they want to play the games on real grass.

[martinbradleey]

The tournament will not accept a 3G or 4G surface, so the Brandywell is ruled out.

[Keyser Soze]

So there's no great political or sectarian conspiracy then?
Simply the fact that we put down a 4g pitch.

[stevebradley]

The tournament will not accept a 3G or 4G surface, so the Brandywell is ruled out.

So rather than spend a load of money making Celtic Park only passible for the tournament, why not use some of that cash to install a new hybrid pitch at the Brandywell ? The current 4G surface will already be approaching 6yrs old at that stage, so more than half way through its shelf life anyway. And at least that way there'll be a legacy left for football - not another sport that actively discriminates against football.

[KEVK]

Sinn Fein need to drop the pipe dream of using Celtic Park for the U21S Championships.

Even if Derry could get included as a venue, CP needs a tonne of work done to it to get it up to scratch. That money should be spent on improving a football stadium in Derry and creating a legacy for that sport - not spunked on fixing up a GAA ground that would then stay firmly out of bounds for 'soccer' events locally for the foreseeable future.

That said - I'm by no means convinced that SF are genuinely doing much about trying to get the U21s to Derry anyway.

I agree. In fact I put all of these issues to her in my reply along with other issues and I have just received another reply that she has "been working with the GAA,FAI and IFA on all the issues that you have mentioned. We are working our way through various options and we would hope to settle on these over the coming months."

Again, I would be sceptical enough. However, it does seem to be an implicit admission that the Brandywell is nowhere near adequate despite having millions of pounds spent on it.

I think Elisha and Sinn Feinn are too embarrassed to admit that the Brandywell is nowhere near the standard needed considering they championed themselves as delivering a "world class" stadium and actually thought there was nothing wrong with the Brandywell in its current state to be considered for such tournaments.

[marcoloco]

SF need to get a grip promoting Celtic Park as a preferred choice for any future football games. Complete and utter of waste of everyone's time. Depressing that these people are the 'voice' on such issues. We need some logical thinking and helpful suggestions. Not more political gestures.

[joe3576]

Northern Ireland will be hosting the Uefa u19 Championships next year.

Venues will be Windsor, Mourneview, Ballymena and Portadown.

https://www.irishfa.com/news/2019/augus ... ndsor-park

No huge surprise there tbh.

With the addition of Crusaders, those are the best grounds in the Irish League. And they're not going to risk hosting Northern Ireland fixtures in Derry/the Brandywell, for obvious reasons - even though the stadium is more than capable of holdng them. .

Portadown is a shambles of a ground Steve, one stand is lying derelict and nothing behind one of the goals - pitch is very very bad too. Ballinamallard, Dungannon, Coleraine and Warrenpoint are far better

[KEVK]

If the IFA are serious about trying to stop Derry born players switching to the Republic of Ireland, then they should be going out of their way to make sure Derry is included in these tournaments - even if it means IFA have to fund necessary upgrades to the stadium

Derry not being included should be highlighted the next time we hear IFA moaning about losing players to the Republic

[rodgers]

I submitted an FOI request on this issue to the Council. While they only confined their review to the new Derry and Strabane Council and not the old Council (which is questionable), the Council confirmed to me that:

1. The Brandywell cannot host any matches at the u21 tournament, because it is category 2 and only categories 3 and 4 can be used. (Didn't think the Ballymena Showgrounds was category 3 and no mention of the pitch as a reason.)

2. Apparently it can host matches at next year's u19 tournament (at which both north and south will be playing I think) but that the IFA chose not to select it as a venue because of the artificial pitch. The Council did not tell me how they came to know this.

[Marty]

If the IFA are serious about trying to stop Derry born players switching to the Republic of Ireland, then they should be going out of their way to make sure Derry is included in these tournaments - even if it means IFA have to fund necessary upgrades to the stadium

Derry not being included should be highlighted the next time we hear IFA moaning about losing players to the Republic

Not sure why anyone would want this.

[KEVK]

If the IFA are serious about trying to stop Derry born players switching to the Republic of Ireland, then they should be going out of their way to make sure Derry is included in these tournaments - even if it means IFA have to fund necessary upgrades to the stadium

Derry not being included should be highlighted the next time we hear IFA moaning about losing players to the Republic

Not sure why anyone would want this.

You wouldn't want Derry and the Brandywell to be included as a host in these tournaments?

You wouldn't want our stadium to receive an upgrade so it can be included in these tournaments?

I couldn't care less what country Derry born players chose to represent.

[marcoloco]

Not sure if im getting excited over nothing but under 'Investment' this new Stormont deal states

"Plan to complete both regional and sub-regional stadia programmes"

That must mean the Brandywell's MF stand is to be finished?

[Keyser Soze]

I'll not hold my breath.

[stevebradley]

Not sure if im getting excited over nothing but under 'Investment' this new Stormont deal states

"Plan to complete both regional and sub-regional stadia programmes"

That must mean the Brandywell's MF stand is to be finished?

I did a piece on this for Radio Foyle on Friday, as it's not clear yet.

That bit in the Stormont agreement refers to the sports stadium fund that was already agreed in 2011. It had almost £110m to do up Windsor, Casement and Ravenhill (the Regional Stadia), and a further £36.2m for "sub-regional stadia". The Windsor and Ravenhill projects are complete and came in on-budget. Casement Park - which is £62m of Stormont money on its own (hashtag white elephant), is mired in a Judicial Review and seriously behind schedule. They've already spent over £10m of the money for it on fees, court cases etc and have yet to even have planning permission - let alone break ground.

The Sub-Regional money is just for football and was due to be spent by March 2018 (coincidentally the date that Brandywell reopened), but got delayed by a legal challenge - and then Stormont collapsed. So the money is still there to be spent and WILL be allocated. Who to is the big question though.

The £36.2m Sub-Regional money is to be divided as follows :

1) £10m for a single new stadium of 6-8,000 capacity.
2) £17m towards "significiant stadium upgrades", up to a maximim of £3m per project.
3) £3m for an NI Training Centre/Centre of Excellence.
4) £3m for irisih League Championship (Level 2) grounds.
5) £3m for lower league stuff.

It was widely believe back in 2011 that Martin McGuinness and Peter Robinson had done a deal on the Sub-Regional money - with Glentoran getting the £10m for a new Stadium, and Derry getting a chunk of the £17m to complete the Mark Farren Stand.

WHERE DOES THIS LEAVE DERRY NOW ?
There are a few things which I fear will make it tricky for us to access this funding now :

1) The pot of money remains the same, but construction costs have increased since 2011. So the same money can deliver less.
2) Neither McGuinness nor Robinson are in politics any more, so any agreement they may have had is irrelevant.
3) The Brandywell as it is now is unfinished, but is arguably still the best ground in NI apart form Windsor. It's definitely not the worst anyway.
4) DCFC rarely fills Brandywell at the moment, so can't argue that the current ground doesn't meet its needs.
5) Stute were made homeless by flooding in August 2017, and need a new home. Brandywell is just too big for them, and they rightly want to have their own facilities to help generate some income for themselves. It will therefore be hard to deny some support to them from this money - especially if they stay in the top tier. Will Stormont realistically give funding to 2 different stadia in Derry ?
6) There will be politics involved in this. The Irish League clubs are all scrabbling amongst themselves to access the £17m fund. Cliftonville already have planning permisison for a new stand and will be hopefuly to get something from this (especially in the marginal Belfast North constituency). Crusaders are looking for funding too, and took Stormont to court over the distribution policy for it. So they'll all be fighting amongst themeelves for the money - and doubtless also pointing out that Derry City doesn't play in NI and already has a perfectly good stadium which it doesn't currently fill. And they will have a point in that.

The positive within this is that the Communities portfolio (which includes sport) now has a Sinn Fein Minster - Deirdre Hargey, Belfast South. This probably gives us a better shot at funding than had it been a DUP one.

In short - there's money there for football stadia around NI, and I'd be stunned if some of it didn't come to Derry. But whether that's to anyone other than Stute remains to be seen, and I fear we may struggle. We therefore need the Derry SF MLAs to step up to the plate on this and lean on their Minister.

As an aside - if I was the club, I'd be looking at ways to ensure every game this season was a full house. Regardless of how that's done. As having almost all of our games running below capacity undermines any argument to complete the Mark Farren Stand IMO. Extra capacity is just not needed beyond the occasional League Cup Final and possibly European games (and not even them if the club fcuks up the pricing).There is money there to do this work, and who knows how long it'll take for the MF to be completed if it doesn't get access to this funding. So the club and council should be doing everything it can to build the case for that job to be finished from this funding pot.

[marcoloco]

Steve - cheers for the detailed post. I don't care what anyone says but you can not get this level of information on any other DCFC social media platforms.

One thing - no team in NI fills their ground and Windsor is only full when used for NI games. So i'm less concerned about needing to demonstrate that we're operating to capacity. What we can point to is near full attendances for the big games with potential to go further and get even more bums on seats.

If Stormont want sub-regional stadia then you look away from Belfast and the NW is the obvious choice. I understand Stute want funds but that should be part of a local community facility somewhere in the Waterside. The Brandywell has an unfinished stand and serves an entire City - i think if there's any sense they'll finish the job they started and deliver a fit for purpose regional stadium with a 6k capacity.

Wishful thinking maybe...