Don’t understand why Newcastle United fans would have problem moving from St James’ Park if… | OneFootball

St James’ Park is the big topic of debate for Newcastle United fans.

Should I (we) stay or should I (we) go?

St James’ Park or a brand new stadium on another site?

The football club had led us to believe that their decision was imminent.

Newcastle United Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Darren Eales earlier this year stated this to be the case.

Then Brad Miller, the Newcastle United Chief Operating Officer (COO) repeated this ahead of the 2024/25 season.

However, then the club announced via their recent FAB (Fan Advisory Board) that actually, it would be now early in 2025, at the earliest, when a final decision would be announced.

Brad Miller is the one who will take the leading role in any projects such as this, the decision to move to a new site and build a brand new stadium, or redeveloping St James’ Park.

When he was appointed in May 2024, Miller stated “I am looking forward to helping Newcastle United to move forward with its ambitious, sustainable development plans…”

Here’s hoping we ‘move forward’ very soon.

The reality for me is that as a supporter, I don’t understand why Newcastle United fans would have any problem moving from St James’ Park.

I am talking here about Newcastle United fans who say that under no circumstances should NUFC play anywhere but the exact site where they do so currently.

Well, I was taken to my first matches in the early 1970s, just over 50 years ago.

Not a single person who is sitting in St James’ Park today, was sitting in the exact same place when I went to my first games. Nobody.

St James’ Park is unrecognisable now.

If you showed somebody who was none the wiser, a neutral, a photo of St James’ Park in 1971, they would have no idea it was the home of Newcastle United.

The ‘New’ stand opened in late 1973 and is the only part of St James’ Park now remotely recognisable from back then and even that is debatable. When that East Stand was put up in 1973 it had a standing paddock in front, which then became the ‘Benches’ in the 1980s.

The big problem I think is that stupid questions are phrased by the media as ‘Do you want to stay at St James’ Park, or leave?’, as was the case with Eddie Howe this past week.

Of course, anybody’s emotional response is instinctively wanting to stay at the current St James’ Park.

How though can you answer that question, if you aren’t then given the other option?

If the other option is to move out of the city centre, to Gosforth Park or an industrial estate etc, then fair enough, I agree that is out of the question personally.

However, if it is a case of moving a couple of hundred yards to Leazes Park/Castle Leazes and build a completely brand new stadium, why would any Newcastle United fans have a problem with that? Especially if it allowed tens of thousands more fans to watch their team AND gave the club a far better chance of competing on and off the pitch.

If Newcastle United fans can have basically their exact same routine on a matchday, apart from maybe a couple of hundred yards further to walk, why would you be saying this under no circumstances should be allowed to happen.

There is no way that Arsenal would be competing now if they hadn’t make their move a few hundred yards from Highbury to The Emirates.

Likewise, the same with Tottenham. Their brand new stadium is right next to where White Hart Lane was BUT on a different site and a whole new stadium.

The thing is as well, if a brand new Newcastle United stadium could be built in the general area of the current site, towards Leazes Park/Castle Leazes then the reality is that with a blank canvas, a superb state of the art (hopefully 80,000) stadium can be built and we have have massive safe standing areas to help improve the atmosphere, the quality of the view will be so much better from the worst seat in such a state of the art 80,000 capacity stadium, than is the case with the view from the worst seats in our current 52,000 capacity St James’ Park.

Everybody could still go to the same pubs, restaurants, cafes, whatever, as they currently do. Just more of us could do so AND the club far more able to compete on and off the pitch.