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Back to drawing board New Wembley will have to be bigger for athletics
Posted: Wednesday December 01, 1999 02:53 PM
LONDON (AP) -- England's bid to stage the 2006 World Cup was thrown into turmoil Wednesday when plans to build a new Wembley stadium were put on hold by the government. Only eight months before FIFA decides where the 2006 event will be held, government minister Chris Smith said the proposed stadium -- the centerpiece of the bid - was too small for other showpiece events such as the Olympics and World Athletics Championships. Smith, whose department has the power to withhold part of the funding, ordered organizations behind the building of the new Wembley to come up with a solution to the problem by Dec. 15. If they don't, then the bids for all three events would be under threat. The bidders had sold the idea of building a new 475 million pound ($760 million) stadium partly on the basis that it would be big enough to handle track as well. On that basis, Britain made plans to bid for the 2012 Olympics and the 2005 World Championships. The proposed design called for a temporary running track and infield to be built above the playing surface, reducing the capacity from 90,000 for soccer to 67,500 for athletics. Within days of the plans being announced came reports that the stadium would fall short of the Olympic requirement of at least 80,000 seats. Although the IOC said it has no such fixed guidelines, Smith ordered the organizations behind the Wembley project to go back to the drawing board. He said he had reached the "reluctant conclusion" that the present design "cannot readily provide the central venue for an Olympic Games bid for London." It was unlikely, he added, that the stadium, as designed, could provide an appropriate venue for the World Athletics Championship. Replying to Smith's statement, opposition lawmaker Peter Ainsworth told the House of Commons that a further delay would undermine England's World Cup bid. He accused Smith's department of "dither, delay and incompetence." England's World Cup bid took another blow when the London Evening Standard newspaper reported that 11 of the grounds intended for use in 2006 did not meet certain FIFA technical requirements. FIFA said that the distances between the field and he perimeter walls were not wide enough to allow for sufficient advertising as well as TV camera access.
A bid spokesman said that there was enough space and argued that FIFA had been sent the wrong measurements after the clubs had confused the complex technical guidelines.
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