Following the demise of the Brady-Sullivan regime, West Ham’s board have undergone something of a charm offensive with major stakeholders, especially their London Stadium landlords.
The new-look Hammers ownership shifted to a more conciliatory stance, culminating in London Stadium being included in the London bid for the Word Athletics Championships for 2029, which involved West Ham agreeing to forgo their right as main occupant to -possibly- three home games in September of that year so the the Athletics stadium could be used as the venue for the “London 29” bid.
“Significant” (although as yet not published) benefits behind the scenes were thought to have been offered as a sweetener for West Ham’s participation – which led to conjecture that a softening of the stance around the club buying the Olympic Stadium at some point might suddenly have been discussed as part of a ‘quid pro quo’ agreement.
Especially pertinent with events that followed around Amanda Staveley’s interest in acquiring the club.
Amanda Staveley: Looking for a ‘property opportunity’ in her football club acquisition
All of which has come to nothing: London has failed in it’s bid, Keeley Hodgkinson and all, to stage the 2029 World Athletics Championships which has been awarded to .. Nairobi.
However, whatever behind-the-scenes concessions the West Ham board secured (and depending on which whisper you believe, these may be quite significant in the near future) by allowing their home stadium to be used within the bid will likely remain, of course now at ‘zero cost’ with the football programme of September 2029 now unaffected.
London’s loss could be West Ham’s gain, it would seem.
I can~t recall a major athletics event at the LS. Birmingham has a 23,000 capacity. How many would buy tickets for the LS? Not many more than that figure. Athletics is dying financially.
Diamond League event is as sell out every year and err, the 2017 World Athletics Championships – capacity crowd every day. 2012 Olympic Games -80,000 capacity every day. I guess you aren’t even a West Ham fan otherwise you know that the London Stadium is the Olympic Stadium – clue it’s on the Olympic Park.
The article I read was that one of the reasons London wasnt chosen, was due to the most recent Europeam track event, last month in Birmingham, had crowds of less than 15,000.
Hopefully, that places reality on the longterm contract for Athletics at the London Stadium, with an Actual Football Stadium built to replace this awful Stadium.
Knocking on the door of 70 years old, having to wait until 2029 would have been too long for people my age. Build something now before we go to kick up the daisies.
I doubt it. Birmingham was never a good choice to host the Europeans, even with hardcore athletics fans, and they made a major blunder by pricing the tickets far too high. London lost purely because World Athletics wanted Africa to get it. A new bid for 2035 or 37 is highly likely. London will still get big crowds and would have sold out easily for the World’s.
As for West Ham well we have no devine right to kick Athletics out and their contract is as cast iron as ours is.