A tour of upgraded new look Newcastle United training ground – A must watch here | OneFootball

The Newcastle United training ground had become a source of much amusement for outsiders.

A constant embarrassing reminder to all Newcastle fans of what a near decade and a half of Mike Ashley ownership represented.

As rival Premier League owners backed the future health of their football clubs by investing heavily, to varying degrees, in the infrastructure via spending on their stadium, training ground and Academy, Mike Ashley remaining at the very bottom over the course of his ownership when it came to capital / infrastructure spending.

When the new owners got the keys from Ashley in October 2021, the Newcastle United training ground was declared not fit for purpose. An embarrassment compared to what is the norm at other Premier League clubs.

The new Newcastle United owners committing very early on to a brand new state of the art training complex but at the same time acknowledging that this wouldn’t / couldn’t happen overnight, meaning that there would be also in the shorter-term, significant investment in the current training facilities, which the club / new owners don’t even own.

There was an update back in October 2022 on both the planned new Newcastle United training ground and the improvements at the current facility.

The Athletic reporting that sources inside the club have told them that they have currently narrowed down the site for the brand new state of the art Newcastle United training ground to four potential sites. Though meetings are also planned in the near future with other big local landowners, to see if another alternative site would be even better.

The club sources telling them that it will take three years at least before the new Newcastle United training ground could be ready, taking into account all the steps to go through, including buying the land and then getting the necessary planning permission, before work can even start.

The report also revealing that the outline plans for the new Newcastle United training ground have been enhanced further, with them now including sleeping quarters for players. This has meant the need for a bigger site than originally envisaged and the thinking behind the sleeping quarters, is that they ‘may be helpful after long trips or to help those with young families to rest and focus’.

With a three years minimum before a new Newcastle United training ground could be ready, this helped explain the urgent necessity for improvements in the existing training facility.

Eddie Howe the key driver in making clear what was desperately needed with essential improvements to the current / temporary facility, this includes spending of at least £1m on building and maintaining a new hydrotherapy unit.

This didn’t apparently include ordering in any more kids’ paddling pools…

…or wheelie bins…

Explaining the urgent decisions and moves needed regarding the training facilities, The Athletic back in October 2022 quoting a source inside the club stating ‘We’ve had to invest because you can’t have players coming here that don’t have somewhere decent to train. It was embarrassing, frankly.’ The report at the time said that much of the work at the current training facility should be completed early 2023.

As for the Newcastle United Academy, inevitably this was yet another area which suffered from a serious lack of investment under Mike Ashley.

The Athletic revealing that an average budget for a typical Premier League Category 1 academy is around £6.3m BUT under Mike Ashley only around half that was budgeted for per year.

Under the new owners though, significant increased funds have been made available to spend on pitches and upgraded facilities, as well as no doubt the staff working at Academy level.

Under Mike Ashley the lack of NUFC first team players produced by the Academy has been a joke, very much a feeling that the likes of Sean Longstaff and Elliot Anderson have come through despite the Ashley level he had the Academy at, rather than because of it.

The Athletic quoting an inside the club source back in October 2022…’We’ve got to produce a world class facility if we’re going to produce world class players.’ Which very nicely sums up the past, present and future, almost a decade and a half of neglect and lack of investment, with the work now started on putting that right. It won’t happen overnight BUT what a relief and a great feeling that finally our football club, at all levels, is once again heading in the right direction.