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Tottenham Hotspur Stadium - Licence To Stand

He is an absolute thunderclam

OK, not a John Cross fan, obviously, but I did hear his match report and he referred to the stadium as White Hart Lane, which was nice to hear. As for him being bitter, well cut him some slack, think how disappointed he was after Spurs scored. :) :) :)
 
OK, not a John Cross fan, obviously, but I did hear his match report and he referred to the stadium as White Hart Lane, which was nice to hear. As for him being bitter, well cut him some slack, think how disappointed he was after Spurs scored. :) :) :)

The late evening BBC Sport on their news channel told us that Brighton had lost at Wembley.

I was at the game, so now know I can be in two places at once. The BBC said it, so it must be true
 
Think it was posted somewhere else .. sorry if duplicate

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/f...um-host-Champions-League-final-Superbowl.html

Tottenham chairman Daniel Levy wants the club's state-of-the-art new stadium to host the Champions League final.

The Tottenham Hotspur Stadium was finally opened earlier this month and has so far hosted three senior games, including the first leg of their Champions League quarter-final clash with Emirates Marketing Project.

But Levy wants to go a few steps further by hosting the final of the illustrious competition itself, insisting the 62,062-seat arena would be a first class choice for the showpiece event.

Speaking to the Evening Standard, Levy said: 'We have been delighted with the reaction from our fans and all visitors since we officially opened our new home two weeks ago. Our aim was always to create an iconic multi-use venue capable of hosting world-class events.

'We have the top UEFA stadium status, which means the venue is fit to stage any European football event, and we believe the stadium's extensive capabilities, particularly the flexibility of having two surfaces, mean we can host a vast range of world-class sporting and entertainment events.

'We'd be open to having conversations if the relevant organisations were interested in using our stadium.
 
The Brighton fans generally seemed to like the stadium, but there's one issue that was mentioned by Palace fans as well:

The Spurs fans behind us in Corporate were horrible, being offensive and aggressive at the end of the game. Not sure our fans bothered reacting, but it would be a big flash point at some games (they play West Ham on Saturday). Would not be surprised if they have a problem with this soon.

https://www.northstandchat.com/showthread.php?372310-THFC-Stadium
 
The Brighton fans generally seemed to like the stadium, but there's one issue that was mentioned by Palace fans as well:
The Spurs fans behind us in Corporate were horrible, being offensive and aggressive at the end of the game. Not sure our fans bothered reacting, but it would be a big flash point at some games (they play West Ham on Saturday). Would not be surprised if they have a problem with this soon.


https://www.northstandchat.com/showthread.php?372310-THFC-Stadium

I was talking with a ST holder who sits in the East Stand next to the away fans and he said that during the City game our fans above the away fans were throwing things at the fans down below.
It doesn't augur well.
Also said the stewards where he sits have said they are dreading Saturday.
 
The Brighton fans generally seemed to like the stadium,
https://www.northstandchat.com/showthread.php?372310-THFC-Stadium

"Yes agree. Everything about it is great. Easily the best I've been to.

Only downside is the location and the ball ache that it is to get away after the game, but I am sure they will improve that over time.

Makes Arsenal and the Emirates look totally tin pot. West Ham is miles short of it and as for Palace....

Spurs now own London football. No one is even close. Fair play to them."

From supporters of a team that had held out until, and then lost in the 88th minute. Hats off Mr Levy! Hats off!
 
This is a Brighton blog I occasionally follow - the post is about the game, but also about the existential questions Brighton fans (and really, all fans of teams that struggle in the Prem) ask themselves.

And it's also about the stadium.

http://www.wearebrighton.com/matchday/match-review-tottenham-hotspur-1-0-brighton/

'Match Review: Tottenham Hotspur 1-0 Brighton

One of the most interesting things about Brighton and Hove Albion’s dire run of form lately has been the increasing number of people who have talked about relegation from the Premier League actually being a positive thing.

These aren’t just new supporters who aren’t used to us losing a few games either. Proper dyed in the wool Albion fans who’ve been there through the toughest times are publicly saying they wouldn’t mind us going down as they don’t like the Premier League. You won’t find a more dedicated Albion fan than John Baine, and yet he sparked quite the debate about it with a post on an Albion Facebook group before Saturday’s trip to Wolverhampton Wanderers.

The theory goes that if we go down, we’ll win more games and it will therefore be more enjoyable. Except we might not. Of the teams relegated last season, only West Bromwich Albion look likely to finish in the top six this year.

In the past 20 years, only 10 teams have won an immediate return to the top flight. The Championship is a ridiculously tough division to get out of and there are no guarantees of success, especially when your squad could end up being dismantled. That would probably happen to us with the likes of Maty Ryan, Lewis Dunk and Shane Duffy sure to attract big offers from elsewhere.

Then there is the financial argument in favour of going down. The Championship is cheaper and you get eight extra games. Except it isn’t cheaper. Last time we were in the second tier, we were paying nearly £40 for tickets to games at Ipswich Town and The Leeds United. There is no £30 cap on away tickets, as there is in the Premier League.

The division also features many more northern clubs with all the additional traveling costs that come with that. Quite simply, anybody who thinks it will be beneficial to their wallet for Brighton to be in the Championship doesn’t go to enough away games.

But the real argument against the Championship being a better division than the Premier League is a night like Tottenham Hotspur away. How could you not enjoy Tuesday night? Watching the Albion go toe-to-toe with one of the finest sides in Europe in one of the greatest stadiums in the world. Anybody who wants to swap that for Rotherham United on a Tuesday night should report to their nearest secure psychiatric unit.

Virtually everything about the trip to Spurs was incredible. £4 an Amstel. Which is poured through the bottom of the pint glass. £3.50 a sausage roll. Rails in front of your seats to lean on when everybody is inevitably standing up. That stand behind the goal that is so huge it seems to disappear into the sky.

The roof which looks like something designed by NASA. The ludicrous number of floodlights which light the whole place up so elegantly. Even the transport wasn’t that bad for a stadium still working out how to cope with 60,000 visitors. They’ll nail that eventually – remember the woes we had getting to and from the Amex in the first season?


On the pitch, the Albion’s performance was nearly as impressive as the surroundings. It was probably one of our best showings away against one of the big six. Only a brilliant finish from Christian Eriksen two minutes from time stopped Chris Hughton becoming the first opposition manager to walk away from the new stadium with a point.

That would have been just reward for a positive line up. Many of us had expected changes ahead of Saturday’s crucial game with Saudi Sportswashing Machine, but nobody could have predicted that they’d be so attacking. Two strikers were on the pitch in Florin Andone and Jurgen Locadia, two attacking midfielders in Pascal Gross and Yves Bissouma and one winger in Alireza Jahanbakhsh.

Seemingly gone was Hughton’s customary caution as he named a side that looked like it had been selected by a man who’d enjoyed one too many of the fine wines and vintage cognacs on offer in the stadium’s temperature controlled cellar.

Although the stats show that we mustered just one shot on target, the Albion actually looked quite good playing on the counter attack. That will come as little surprise to those of us who’ve spent the past year saying that Hughton needs to select more pace when we’re playing away from home.

Andone had probably the best chance from open play when he surged into the box but was halted by what looked like it might have been a foul just as he was about to shoot. Replays later showed it to be a perfectly timed tackle, although the bigger question was why he didn’t pull the trigger earlier?

Aside from that opportunity, set pieces appeared to be our best chance of scoring for the first time in seven games – now the longest run without a goal in Albion history. Dunk and Duffy both went close as Gross sent in the sort of teasing deliveries which suggested he is getting back to somewhere near his best.

At the other end, Dunk, Duffy and Ryan were magnificent. The defensive duo made one unbelievable goal line block each as they threw their bodies at everything and anything. Ryan meanwhile looked unbeatable and would have had a second consecutive clean sheet were it not for a moment of magic from Eriksen with two minutes remaining.

There didn’t seem to be any danger when Dele Alli found the Dane miles out from goal but Eriksen advanced and unleashed the most accurate shot you’ll ever see from a full 25 yards which beat the despairing dive of Ryan to nestle in the bottom corner. A quality moment from a quality player.




For Spurs, that goal brought relief. For the Albion, it was despair. We’d been just minutes away from taking a point against a side in the last four of the Champions League. It was all a far cry from losing 5-0 at home to Bournemouth.

If Brighton can replicate the performance levels they showed against Spurs in the final three fixtures of the season, we should have enough to stay up. A win against Saudi Sportswashing Machine should do it – play like this against the Toon Army and there’s every chance three very important points will be in the bag come Saturday evening.

And whilst that might not please those who are yearning for days out in Luton and Blackburn next season because it might mean we win a few games, for those of us who want to see Brighton competing against the best players in the world in the most famous venues in the country, survival is crucial. Spurs away again next year, please.'

2019-04-spurs-review-800x445.jpg


 
This is a Brighton blog I occasionally follow - the post is about the game, but also about the existential questions Brighton fans (and really, all fans of teams that struggle in the Prem) ask themselves.

And it's also about the stadium.

http://www.wearebrighton.com/matchday/match-review-tottenham-hotspur-1-0-brighton/

'Match Review: Tottenham Hotspur 1-0 Brighton

One of the most interesting things about Brighton and Hove Albion’s dire run of form lately has been the increasing number of people who have talked about relegation from the Premier League actually being a positive thing.

These aren’t just new supporters who aren’t used to us losing a few games either. Proper dyed in the wool Albion fans who’ve been there through the toughest times are publicly saying they wouldn’t mind us going down as they don’t like the Premier League. You won’t find a more dedicated Albion fan than John Baine, and yet he sparked quite the debate about it with a post on an Albion Facebook group before Saturday’s trip to Wolverhampton Wanderers.

The theory goes that if we go down, we’ll win more games and it will therefore be more enjoyable. Except we might not. Of the teams relegated last season, only West Bromwich Albion look likely to finish in the top six this year.

In the past 20 years, only 10 teams have won an immediate return to the top flight. The Championship is a ridiculously tough division to get out of and there are no guarantees of success, especially when your squad could end up being dismantled. That would probably happen to us with the likes of Maty Ryan, Lewis Dunk and Shane Duffy sure to attract big offers from elsewhere.

Then there is the financial argument in favour of going down. The Championship is cheaper and you get eight extra games. Except it isn’t cheaper. Last time we were in the second tier, we were paying nearly £40 for tickets to games at Ipswich Town and The Leeds United. There is no £30 cap on away tickets, as there is in the Premier League.

The division also features many more northern clubs with all the additional traveling costs that come with that. Quite simply, anybody who thinks it will be beneficial to their wallet for Brighton to be in the Championship doesn’t go to enough away games.

But the real argument against the Championship being a better division than the Premier League is a night like Tottenham Hotspur away. How could you not enjoy Tuesday night? Watching the Albion go toe-to-toe with one of the finest sides in Europe in one of the greatest stadiums in the world. Anybody who wants to swap that for Rotherham United on a Tuesday night should report to their nearest secure psychiatric unit.

Virtually everything about the trip to Spurs was incredible. £4 an Amstel. Which is poured through the bottom of the pint glass. £3.50 a sausage roll. Rails in front of your seats to lean on when everybody is inevitably standing up. That stand behind the goal that is so huge it seems to disappear into the sky.

The roof which looks like something designed by NASA. The ludicrous number of floodlights which light the whole place up so elegantly. Even the transport wasn’t that bad for a stadium still working out how to cope with 60,000 visitors. They’ll nail that eventually – remember the woes we had getting to and from the Amex in the first season?


On the pitch, the Albion’s performance was nearly as impressive as the surroundings. It was probably one of our best showings away against one of the big six. Only a brilliant finish from Christian Eriksen two minutes from time stopped Chris Hughton becoming the first opposition manager to walk away from the new stadium with a point.

That would have been just reward for a positive line up. Many of us had expected changes ahead of Saturday’s crucial game with Saudi Sportswashing Machine, but nobody could have predicted that they’d be so attacking. Two strikers were on the pitch in Florin Andone and Jurgen Locadia, two attacking midfielders in Pascal Gross and Yves Bissouma and one winger in Alireza Jahanbakhsh.

Seemingly gone was Hughton’s customary caution as he named a side that looked like it had been selected by a man who’d enjoyed one too many of the fine wines and vintage cognacs on offer in the stadium’s temperature controlled cellar.

Although the stats show that we mustered just one shot on target, the Albion actually looked quite good playing on the counter attack. That will come as little surprise to those of us who’ve spent the past year saying that Hughton needs to select more pace when we’re playing away from home.

Andone had probably the best chance from open play when he surged into the box but was halted by what looked like it might have been a foul just as he was about to shoot. Replays later showed it to be a perfectly timed tackle, although the bigger question was why he didn’t pull the trigger earlier?

Aside from that opportunity, set pieces appeared to be our best chance of scoring for the first time in seven games – now the longest run without a goal in Albion history. Dunk and Duffy both went close as Gross sent in the sort of teasing deliveries which suggested he is getting back to somewhere near his best.

At the other end, Dunk, Duffy and Ryan were magnificent. The defensive duo made one unbelievable goal line block each as they threw their bodies at everything and anything. Ryan meanwhile looked unbeatable and would have had a second consecutive clean sheet were it not for a moment of magic from Eriksen with two minutes remaining.

There didn’t seem to be any danger when Dele Alli found the Dane miles out from goal but Eriksen advanced and unleashed the most accurate shot you’ll ever see from a full 25 yards which beat the despairing dive of Ryan to nestle in the bottom corner. A quality moment from a quality player.




For Spurs, that goal bought relief. For the Albion, it was despair. We’d been just minutes away from taking a point against a side in the last four of the Champions League. It was all a far cry from losing 5-0 at home to Bournemouth.

If Brighton can replicate the performance levels they showed against Spurs in the final three fixtures of the season, we should have enough to stay up. A win against Saudi Sportswashing Machine should do it – play like this against the Toon Army and there’s every chance three very important points will be in the bag come Saturday evening.

And whilst that might not please those who are yearning for days out in Luton and Blackburn next season because it might mean we win a few games, for those of us who want to see Brighton competing against the best players in the world in the most famous venues in the country, survival is crucial. Spurs away again next year, please.'

2019-04-spurs-review-800x445.jpg
What a refreshing view from an away fan,rather than all the tribal flimflam that goes on.
 
Thought this nod to the old WHL could go on here:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-48028660

Some nice old pics on the link

When Archibald Leitch died 80 years ago few in football knew his name but his impact on those who watched the game was huge.

Between 1899 and his death on 25 April 1939, the Scottish architect built stands for Rangers, Chelsea, Fulham, Spurs, Liverpool, Everton, Manchester United, Arsenal, Aston Villa and many more.


In fact, at his peak in the late 1920s, 16 out of the 22 clubs in the English First Division had hired Leitch's company at one time or another.

He also designed a greyhound and speedway stadium in London, where in the early 1930s there was a doomed attempt to establish a Football League club called Thames AFC.


According to historian Simon Inglis, no other firm of architects before or since has clocked up such a client base in British sport.

Mr Inglis, the author of Engineering Archie: Archibald Leitch - Football Ground Designer, says Leitch's career almost ended in disaster as soon as it began but he fought back to dominate British football stadium design for decades.

In more recent times, the Leitch-designed stands have quickly disappeared as new modern stadiums have been built but his influence can still be seen across England and Scotland.

How did it all begin?


Leitch was born in Glasgow in 1865 and began his working life as a factory architect.

Mr Inglis says the first ground Leitch worked on was Kilmarnock's in 1899.

That same year he was commissioned to design a new stadium for Rangers, the club he supported.

Rangers had been playing in a "fairly basic" 25,000-capacity timber ground and were keen to expand.

They moved to the other side of Ibrox Park and Leitch built a new oval stadium, which by 1902 had a capacity of 80,000.

Ibrox stadium tragedy

But on the very first occasion the ground was tested by a capacity crowd, disaster struck.

Scotland were playing a match against England in April 1902 when a short section of timber terracing behind one of the goals gave way, sending 25 fans to their deaths.

Leitch was at the game and witnessed the tragic events.

An inquiry was held into the deaths and, according to Mr Inglis, the blame fell on the inferior wood which had been used on the terracing.


The Ibrox terrace was built in a way which was common at the time, with wooden flooring on top of an iron frame.

"Today we would call them bleachers," Mr Inglis says. "They were very popular in American baseball stadiums."

It transpired that yellow pine was used at Ibrox instead of the superior red pine and this was blamed for the disaster.

Timber merchant Alexander MacDougall was the man who carried the can despite the presiding judge feeling he was perhaps a spacegoat.

Mr Inglis says: "There was evidence that Leitch had approved the use of yellow pine in order to get the job done but MacDougall was equally to blame because apparently he billed Rangers for the higher quality pine."


Despite Leitch escaping criminal prosecution, he was still in danger of losing his career.

Mr Inglis says the architect wrote a letter to Rangers begging them to re-employ him instead of one of his rivals.

He says: "Leitch writes to Rangers and basically says 'if you sack me then you will effectively be saying that I am guilty'."

Leitch's letter goes on: "I need hardly say what an unutterable anguish the accident caused me, surely the most unhappy eyewitness of all."

Mr Inglis says Leitch was a charismatic man and a good salesman who was determined to clear his name after the disaster.


Leitch, a prominent Protestant church-goer and freemason, eventually persuaded Rangers to give him another chance.

Mr Inglis says: "Archie to his credit gets the job back with Rangers to replace the terracing and does what every good engineer will do, he goes back to the drawing board."

The result was a patented form of terracing which is formed by solid ground - effectively earth banks - to make them stronger.

He also unveiled tubular steel crush barriers which were built into the slope and form a network of steel and concrete that sat on top of the bank.


The first grounds to benefit from this new design were Fulham's Craven Cottage and Chelsea's Stamford Bridge, which were unveiled in 1905.

Leitch's reputation for being able to build functional and budget-conscious football grounds grew.

Mr Inglis says the people who controlled football clubs were "very conservative" and it was hard for Leitch to convince them to take risks with their design, as they were beginning to do in Europe.

But Leitch refined and improved his engineering and design as he moved around England as a "jobbing architect".

In 1923 when Wembley Stadium was built, Leitch was not even considered for the job and was hugely critical of the result.


Mr Inglis says Leitch was not part of "the establishment" and those in charge of football would not have even looked at his designs before awarding the contract to architects who had no experience of building stadiums.

Despite being largely overlooked, Leitch's designs dominated British football until the late 1980s when the Taylor Report following the Hillsborough disaster accelerated the replacement of many of his stands.

His work can still be seen at a number of grounds including Rangers, where the South Stand, built in 1928-9, is category B listed.


The concrete core of Leitch's main stand at Liverpool's Anfield stadium, built in 1906, lives on but it is buried deep within the vast new stand.

Across Stanley Park, two others Leitch stands survive at Goodison Park: the Bullens Road Stand (1926) and Gwladys Street (1938) but they may not be around for much longer if Everton rebuilds.

Fulham, Sheffield Wednesday, Dundee, Aberdeen, Crystal Palace and Portsmouth all have Leitch work that is still standing.


But Tottenham's White Hart Lane is the latest casualty.

Leitch built four stands for Spurs between 1909 and 1934, including the East Stand, but the stadium has now been replaced by a new ground.



When Archibald Leitch died in April 1939, two days short of his 74th birthday, there was not a single obituary in any newspaper.


Spurs play Sheffield United at White Hart Lane in 1936

Mr Inglis says: "It is extraordinary that he died almost completely unknown.

"In those days football ground architects were just not regarded as establishment figures. There was just not the level of press coverage that there is today."


Simon Inglis will be giving a talk on Archibald Leitch in Glasgow on 28 May.
 
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