The next step is for Newcastle’s owners, Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF), to scrutinise the blueprints and choose between options A, B and even C. The final one would involve doing nothing structural and merely giving St James’ a thorough makeover roughly equivalent to a homeowner opting to install a new kitchen and bathroom but stopping short of an extension.
Not that a new-build home would be any simpler, even if it was, as has been seriously considered, built partially on the Leazes End area of the St James’ Park footprint backing on to Leazes Park.
There was talk of another possible stadium site, five miles to the north in Gosforth Park on land owned by the club’s minority shareholders, Reuben Brothers, but that appears to have been dismissed in favour of retaining Newcastle’s iconic central location, a long goalkick away from shops, restaurants and hotels.
Whatever the precise reason, Newcastle remained in the home originally converted from grazing land for Town Moor cattle when, in 1880, St James’ Park was set aside for sporting use by the city’s Freemen.
There are suggestions that the Tyneside-based executives, led by Miller, might be leaning towards the new build but conflicting rumours are doing the rounds, with some individuals convinced PIF will look at the costs involved – roughly up to £800m to redevelop Newcastle’s city-centre home and almost double that to start from scratch – and opt to concentrate on building a state-of-the-art training ground they have long craved instead.
