Why can't it?
I won't like it but it won't stop me going to Belle Vue to watch Wakefield play.
Unless someone makes a new rule to say we can't play in SL unless we have a new stadium it is just down to how long we can squeeze out an income from it.
Fans not coming will be the main thing which of course is hurting us now but you can't put a time number on it.... Only a financial one.

People talk like Wakefield Trinity don't want a new or redeveloped stadium. Trinity are not the barrier to progress on the issue.

No-one wants a new stadium more than Trinity. Michael Carter is clear that it's the current stadium (and it's costs/income potential), that is preventing the club from making the next step on the field and commercially.

There's a massive undeveloped pit site at Sharlston, half way between Wakefield and Cas, but the only way it, or any other groundshare option is considered, is if the Cas project fails.

If Wakey's fails, WMDC/Box, will let them whither. If Cas's fails, WMDC/Box, will press for a shared middle ground, to sustain them.

I understand what you mean but you can’t forget that Trinity are at least in part a barrier because they effectively need someone else to pay for the stadium, or most of it anyway.

So whilst the Council are pillocks, this is still ultimately a mess of Trinity’s own making.

Name me one other club who have built a new ground or redeveloped the existing one without council or developer hand outs. You can’t and therefore it’s not trinity’s fault that the council are incompetent and the particular developers in our case are morally bankrupt.

How could the club have done things differently that would have changed the position?

That's an easy position to adopt from your ivory tower
Who else in SL built and/or owns their own ground ?

Leeds, St Helens, Cas ?

Warrington via a holding company ?

Hudds have a 20% stake in their football ground holding company
Hull council owned
Widnes council owned
Catalans council owned/local authority/whatever
Leigh council owned
HKR council owned
Salford rent from a 3rd party.
Wigan rent from a football club

The premier sport in the Wakefield district does not have a stadium in which to play it.
With the game being in the state it is and with neither Cas nor Wakey having enough conkers between them to build one their own, what is the answer.

The answer isn't "its their own fault" anymore than it was Hudds, Widnes, Cats, Leigh, Salford, HKR or Wigans own fault.

Average attendance 2018 :

Leeds 12,807
Hull FC 12,175
Wigan 11,773
St Helens 11,479
Warrington 10,088
Catalans 8,354
Castleford 7,848
Hull KR 7,965
Huddersfield 5,721
Wakefield 5,244
Widnes 4,898
Salford 2,966

5 , 244 Average in a 11,000 capacity stadium . Maybe the venture is not financially economical.

If you are going to troll do your homework. The capacity is limited to just over 7k for safety reasons. Oh and we run with 150k of our sky money withheld due to the ground not being up to scratch and still compete without spending what we don’t have

So an extra 500 fans in a ground that holds 25,000 is financially viable?

I think its a case of shared stadium or stay where you are.

Yep, you've just about covered all the options.

Leeds have. Saints did although with chairman assistance.

I haven’t said Wakefield are unique in this but in the end if Wakefield could finance their own stadium or redevelopment they wouldn’t be in as bad a position. So their lack of financial input IS a barrier to them getting a new stadium or redeveloping.

The club could have invested money in Belle Vue over the last 40-50 years instead of spending it all on players and short term gain. That’s what they could have done differently. The sport is hamstrung now because of the short term decisions made by the clubs in the past.

You still sharing with Sheffield




Seriously though, having had land taken from Greenbelt to allow for Industrial development AND a COMMUNITY STADIUM, for this not to happen, aided and abetted by WMDC would be just wrong (on multiple levels).

We have a council and develloper playing the long game, hoping that Trinity just disappear into the ether.

Both the club and it's fans have plenty of fight left in them and EVERY RL and sporting fan should be on the case as well.
IF WMDC are allowed to ignore their obligations, then, who next ??

I didn’t say Wakefield we’re anymore at fault than the vast majority of RL clubs who took the same short-sighted decisions not to invest in their stadiums. But that is still Wakefield’s fault. And the situation is still the same, if Wakefield had invested in their stadium over the years they would not be in as bad a position now.

Haven’t Leeds council provided funding for headingly upgrade and I seem to recall saints got some money from langtree/Tesco

Lets not forget that Trinity were told not to bid for Belle Vue by WMDC when it came up for sale recently . How is that their fault?

I'm sure I read it somewhere that Wakefield wanted to buy the ground off the Bank of Ireland, only to be told by the leader of WMBC not to bid for it and start a bidding war, as the developers who initially let the club down by renaging on the promise of building a new ground at Newmarket in exchange they wanted to buy Bellevue and develop it for the community.

Ive heard this a few times now & whilst not doubting the veracity of the claim; I’m stunned that fans seem ok with MC’s inactivity. My timeline may be a little off, but I’m sure he, along with just about every wakey fan, had been pretty public in displaying zero faith in Peter Box & WMDC prior to this point. So why just accept being told don’t bid?
Can you imagine if this were your house & someone you didn’t trust at all & who you thought actually wanted to see you wither & die, told you they were going to buy your house back from the bank for you so don’t trouble yourself in trying to get your asset back? It would be absolute madness not to bid; irrespective of what anyone was telling you.
The only understandable reason I can think of is that MC/trinity either didn’t have the funds to buy it back or didn’t want to spend his own/trinity’s funds to buy it back - which as I fan I might have a problem with.
I’m not saying MC doesn’t be have some leeway, as he’s done a remarkable job at wakey, but this doesn’t make him free from criticism & if I were a wakey fan I’d think someone should be asking the question of how/why the club allowed this to happen, rather than simply blaming the pantomime villain of the piece in Box/WMDC.

Quote ="Tricky2309"Haven’t Leeds council provided funding for headingly upgrade and I seem to recall saints got some money from langtree/Tesco'" LCC - no funding though they do hold the lease on the re-vamped stands until the loan is paid off https://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/ ... -1-8811875

Quote ="Tricky2309"Haven’t Leeds council provided funding for headingly upgrade and I seem to recall saints got some money from langtree/Tesco'" LCC - no funding though they do hold the lease on the re-vamped stands until the loan is paid off https://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/ ... -1-8811875

Quote ="Clearwing"LCC - no funding though they do hold the lease on the re-vamped stands until the loan is paid off https://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/ ... -1-8811875'" Ok but my point still stands no council involvement no funding. Carter has repeated on more than one occasion that if wdmc borrow the money to build the community stadium, trinity would pay the interest on the loan until such time as the council recoup the cost from the developer

Quote ="Clearwing"LCC - no funding though they do hold the lease on the re-vamped stands until the loan is paid off https://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/ ... -1-8811875'" Ok but my point still stands no council involvement no funding. Carter has repeated on more than one occasion that if wdmc borrow the money to build the community stadium, trinity would pay the interest on the loan until such time as the council recoup the cost from the developer

it wouldn't of ended there would it, had they purchased the ground they would of then been pressured then to get it up to scratch and believe me that would cost a fair bit, and it would of been the same WMDC guys pushing this that reduced the holding capacity

I couldn't see this happen as the council have difficulty wiping its own arris of late

I remember it a little different, wasn't it Sir Rodders that told the club not to put a bid in because as head of the Community trust he'd been in meetings with WMDC and Yorkcourt at that time and they were going to buy it instead of the Newmarket build and redevelop the whole thing and if the owner knew there were 2 interested parties it would bunk up the price. Obviously, it turned out to be bull and was one of the reasons Sir Rodders got the boot from the Community Trust.

There would have been funding. The funding is coming from Leeds and Yorkshire, not the Council. Council involvement has made the terms of the funding better but not provided any funding. Leeds and Yorkshire would have gone ahead with the plans anyway and just paid the loans off over a longer time frame.

In the end it’s a much, much lower risk for LCC to do what they did than WMDC take on millions of pounds of debt when Wakefield Trinity have no assets backing them up compared to Leeds who have around £15-£20m.

I remember a conversation I had with Lordy down at Stanley Rangers who had at the time a phone call from Richardson inviting a teams at SR to use the Newmarket ground for training, was exciting times as he was confident that it was going to happen, what we didn't know is that BV was sold to help keep up with other clubs chasing success a risk now that I bet he wished he hadn't taken as history showed it now left us with no assets for what it was worth

Quote ="Clearwing"LCC - no funding though they do hold the lease on the re-vamped stands until the loan is paid off https://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/ ... -1-8811875'" What is refreshing about that and others that I've seen and reads, is the language and enthusiasm your local Council has about the Rugby and Cricket Club and the motivation to get the deal done for the Clubs. You should here our 'Leader' on the radio duck & dodge questions about the Newmarket development and what's happened there over the years.

Quote ="Clearwing"LCC - no funding though they do hold the lease on the re-vamped stands until the loan is paid off https://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/ ... -1-8811875'" What is refreshing about that and others that I've seen and reads, is the language and enthusiasm your local Council has about the Rugby and Cricket Club and the motivation to get the deal done for the Clubs. You should here our 'Leader' on the radio duck & dodge questions about the Newmarket development and what's happened there over the years.