A number of West Ham United fans are unhappy with how the club’s heralded move to the former Olympic Stadium has panned out so far.
West Ham’s move to Stratford from their beloved Upton Park was beset by problems from the start.
From in-fighting among the club’s fans over persistent standing to segregation issues, violent scenes between home and away supporters and a general dissatisfaction with the atmosphere and feel of a ground many refer to as ‘soulless’.
Ahead of the stadium move, Hammers fans were promised a genuine retractable seating solution in communications from the club.
In reality they have been left with a temporary lower tier built on a complex scaffolding which will reportedly take weeks to deconstruct and reconstruct each season at a cost of £8 million – some £7.7m more than the original estimate.
The distance from the stands to the pitch is a major bone of contention for many fans with the bowl shape of the venue the biggest problem as the stadium was not built with football in mind.
Having signed a 99-year lease many supporters are disillusioned at the prospect of a long-term future at the ground in it’s current state.
The club’s owners David Sullivan and David Gold also pledged that the move would enable West Ham to spend more on quality players in the transfer market in a bid to compete with the Premier League elite.
But the club’s net spend since moving to the ground has paled into insignificance compared to their rivals despite the extra ticket cash, commercial and merchandising revenue streams pushing the club into the prestigious European Deloitte Football Money League Top 20 for the first time, as proudly paraded on its official website last year, and set to announce record income in their latest financial reports.
Some supporters have suggested a lack of serious net spend could point to the club accumulating money to launch a bid to buy the stadium outright in the near future.
Indeed fans are so unhappy many are planning to attend a protest march against the owners before the Burnley game next month.
In an interview with Sport Bible, Sullivan’s son Dave remained coy but admitted it could be on the cards.
When asked ‘Is your dad looking into the possibility of buying the London Stadium outright in the future?’ Sullivan told Sport Bible: “I cannot comment on that, but it is certainly a possibility.”
And now Sullivan’s co-owner David Gold has added further weight to that theory after he endorsed a tweet suggesting that could well be a solution in the future to his near 200,000 following.
One Hammers fans wrote on Twitter: “The (stadium) situation is not beyond redemption. The stadium ownership is sure to come up again soon. At which point we could find ourselves sole owners with the opportunity to address all these issues.”
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