I was reading recently that Newcastle (among other northern clubs) are considering relocating their training grounds to the "London area."
This is because many clubs are realizing that Continental players don't want to really live anywhere else in England and they are having an increasingly hard time attracting players unless they overpay them. To counter this, Newcastle is thinking of building a new training ground in London.
I seriously doubt there are many places to do that in North London at a reasonable price. Which makes me wonder if the Penninsular area (hope I got that name correct) is on other club's radar?
If/when some rich club decides to make the leap with their training ground in that general location or another South London club gets some rich owner and starts sniffing around the area.... what do we do then?
Could we become the next Leyton Orient?
Obviously you all know more about any risk of this than me, but it's on my mind and wanted to see what you all thought about such a possibility.
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Does that also mean there is no way CAFC could ever put a stadium there?
The big London clubs generally have their training grounds outside of London anyway, Spurs and Arsenal's are out by the M25
PENINSUFUCKINGLA!!!
AUUUUGGHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!
Doesn't smell too bad since the old tunnel refineries closed, so not much sniffing.
The area with the driving range and the new music venue is the most prime plot on the Peninsula. Knight Dragon (the developer) plans to build their most premium apartment blocks there, with the best views over Canary Wharf. But they're not planning to build them until the rest of their land on the Peninsula has been developed, so they've let the plot for other uses for around 10 years.
I would agree with others that there's no chance of a northern club setting up a training facility in the area.
I doubt it would happen in England, but football is so mental here that nothing would surprise me.
Any other professional team, particularly a team in the PL, having a presence in LBG is a potential threat to us and we should nip it in the bud.
And then they built roads, trains and aeroplanes. Then they paid players thousands of pounds a week and foreign players saw the light and realised that they had always supported Newcastle as small glassey eyed boys, and that the land of geordies was good. They kissed the badge, swore allegiance and were happy.
Take your example of Newcastle. First things first....the whole squad has to train together yes? So Newcastle build a new training ground in London and over the close season instruct all their playing squad, management team and any relevant support staff that they need to relocate to London and all the logistical hell/problems that would induce. And for every home game the squad would then have to be coached 200+ miles there and the same back. I'm sure they'd enjoy that for home Saturday and Tuesday games.
You're also not thinking about what the actual players/management/staff would think about such a dramatic upheaval. They would have their respective worlds turned upside down for the sake of potential future foreign players that don't even belong to the club yet! They're gonna love that....and last but not least, what do you think the supporters would think of such a move? My guess is that they'd be collectively royally pissed off. It would be seen as a slap in the face. The club would be effectively saying, the area you live in, the town/city we represent, who's name we wear, isn't good enough for our own players to live in.
Might be some truth in this, one of the Newcastle papers has the headline “howay lads, cockneys not content with streets paved with gold steal wor toon”
Given the cost of land in London, I'd be surprised if this idea has wings at all. If a club from the north was to establish a base in the SE, it would be somewhere that was accessible from London and wherever the northerners came from, somewhere like Milton Keynes or Northampton would probably work.