Liberty Stadium to increase capasity - Should the Ospreys move out?

According to the Western Mail, Swansea City are applying to increase capasity by another 10,000

http://www.walesonline.co.uk/footballnation/football-news/2012/03/20/swansea-city-apply-for-planning-permission-to-increase-capacity-of-liberty-stadium-91466-30574838/

With the Ospreys attendances being so low, could or should this trigger a move away from the Stadium, back to St Helen's, the Knoll and to the Brewery Field and have a region that truly plays out in it's region? What do you think?

It will be interesting to see what happens with regards to the Ospreys and the Liberty Stadium, as the FA are not to keen on Premiership sides groundsharing with other sides (fixture clashes etc). That said there are existing deals in place to be honoured etc, so I can't see them being forced out of hte Liberty, unless they chose to leave.

Also I doubt that any of the regions will ever become 'free-roming' around their region (well not until they can secure numbers attending to one ground regularly). The idea is a really good one in principle, however all of the regions are based where the largest population centres are within their region for the reason of transport links and having more fans local to the grounds.

If they do increase capacity then yes. The atmosphere would be ridiculously bad. Isn't there some new stadium being built in Bridgend?

I've heard that once you're in at The Liberty, they don't let you out. This is on account of there being a 'minimum' crowd figure of 100, once below that figure, penalty clauses kick in, so they can't afford to lose a single supporter.

On the other hand, they could relocate to the city mortuary, which will allow the venue to be filled to capacity, and provide a better atmosphere.

First of all, this would be great news for the Swans and the City.

Secondly, I think that using all four grounds throughout the season would be awesome, true regional rugby. I do feel that the other three would need a little developing in terms of facilities and possibly aesthetics would be a must though.

It would be quite simple to strategically allocate each game and give some real ownership to fans of the region

Ospreys should move here if they expand the Liberty http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Bridgend_stadium

Perfect size IMO 15,000. Enough for big derby matches and HC quater/semi finals and not so big that it creates a dull atmosphere for your average pro 12 game. Hopefully it will be a purpose built rugby (union or league) stadium as well.

Although there hasn't been any new of anything actually happening...

gowales wrote:Ospreys should move here if they expand the Liberty http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Bridgend_stadium

Perfect size IMO 15,000. Enough for big derby matches and HC quater/semi finals and not so big that it creates a dull atmosphere for your average pro 12 game. Hopefully it will be a purpose built rugby (union or league) stadium as well.

Although there hasn't been any new of anything actually happening...

The New Stadium was meant to be built for the Crusaders (according to the link) so has probably been dropped altogether what with the Warriors going oop north and then losing the super league deal too.

I think Bridgend's exisiting ground will need to be redeveloped then. O's are suffering from a lack of atmosphere as it is there, add another empty 10,000 seats and it will be truly dreadful.

Time to get out I think, but then again, do they have the money to develop anywhere else?

They might need to get a loan from the local council like Scarlets did, but then we had some money from selling Stradey (even if most of that went on court cases )

I thought the Brewery Field would have been perfect, or there is this other lovely ground over the hill from me called the Gnoll... That would work too if Cuddy patched up his kinship with the NRFC boys.

By the looks of this current project website for the Bridgend Island Farm development, the project is alive and well!

http://www.islandfarm.tv/development/

"A 15,000 seater stadium for Rugby League and Rugby Union satisfying the demanding requirements of Regional and Super League rugby. The stadium will also include the very best facilities for home and visiting supporters. It will have bars, corporate & conference facilities and house administration offices.
A 5,000 seater stadium for the Bridgend Ravens currently playing at brewery field"

Clearly has aspirations for Regional Rugby. Local talk is that Llandarcy Sports are involved in the development, isn't Cuddy behind Llandarcy Sports?

Tell you what that looks amazing!! Looks perfect for to me. Play all there games there except maybe the really big ones, like the xmas derbies or Hcup.

Something like the Blues should do with the Arms Park and CCS.

Looks fantastic. Might Not have to travel to Wimbledon for a tennis fix anymore, the ATP might be coming to South Wales

Maesteg, no wonder you watch the Ospreys, with D Biggar it is like watching tennis minus the net on the half way line.

Yes of course they should move...........back to St Helens and be Swansea again. The Scott Gibbs name is worth more than a WRU Osprey any day of the week.

However, is this another out of town stadium with no where near enough parking.

Yes.

But it is looking like the ospreys will be moving. Personally I want to see a return to the gnoll.

So the Blues share with city = Fail. Move back to CAP iminent (contract dependant)

Ospreys share with city = Fail. Move out iminent.

Scarlets going okay in the WRU's stadium, and Dragons nice new stand an instant hit....

The future = CLUBS!!!

Regions have been semi succesfull up until now, but fan wise just cannot get to grips with everyone, no matter where they play half of the allocated region feels aggreived!

For me we should go back to a club game, use the fans as they are now, each club getting 5k plus, possible 10k at Cardiff etc, play a 12 club league and imitate the super game to an extent and play regional rugby for the HC.

We are not a monster nation, we are small, we enjoy the local rivalries, but we also enjoy being competitive in europe, the Rabo is a nothing league still and is dominated by the Irish money.

If our 4 regions have 3 clubs a peice, we suddenly have the excitement of mass representation, regular local rivalries (with following away support), the excitement of regional representation, and selection, plus we stay competitive in europe, and maybe even more so with a larger player pool to pick from etc...

I dissagree with the idea of leaving the Celtic league. Playing the Irish, italians and Scottish make for tougher competition than the premiership will be able to aspire to.

If we could rejig the season then maybe we could increase the competition of the premiership by introducing more regional players.

I personally think that (having premier seats in the Liberty) they should move out as there is no atmosphere. I feel that talk of moving to Bridgend should not happen as the same situation of "regional" would exist - people don't go to the Liberty because it is in Swansea - why would people from Neath etc. go to Bridgend?

A mobile club sounds like a good idea, but logistically would probably be a nightmare to organise.

I agree with Bluesman... get the pro players playing in club rugby, then form new superclubs for the HEC. Get rid of the Scarlets, Blues, Ospreys and Dragons and form new variants - merging the scarlets and ospreys could potentially be a revelation - the pack of the Ospreys and the backs of the Scarlets - what a team that would be (possible the scaspreys or osplets ). The same for Cardiff & the Dragons. We could then get rid of the journeymen that are taking up huge amounts of the budgets and develop young talent in the clubs/acadamies.

To be honest if we could afford it i would definitely be in favour of an 8 team premiership, if it brings in the crowds then why not?

I disagree, the Italian teams are generally of a lower quality, and the scotts and Connaught are very much hit and miss. Our internationals rarely play Rabo games, and there tends to be a core group of clubmen and NWQ players who play these games. How does that help us out long term?

If we were to just transfer this to clubs, and make the regions welsh only, or only allow 2 NWQ players per squad we would be in a much stronger position.

Which ever way people talk about re-jigging the regions the fact is that the Welsh public have just not taken to them. renaming them, or dropping place names, changing the kit colours and all that sort of talk is pointless as it is not going to make a blind bit of difference.

We are a stubborn bunch and we want to go and watch rugby on a Saturday afternoon, not a Friday night or Sunday.

I would therefore whole heartedly support an 8 team Premier league and a withdrawal from the Rabo.

But I would not have these teams compete in the HC as for that I would draw 3 teams from these sides to play regional rugby in that as North, SE and SW.

The 8 team league could play each other 4 times a season for the league and also could drop in to the Welsh Cup in the later rounds. This would give each club 30 or so games a season of regular Saturday afternoon rugby.

We have about £14.5m to play with according to how much the WRU gives the regions so I would give each club £1m each and use the other £6.5m for regional contracts. The WRU to run the regions and the clubs to run their game.

To me that's a win win scenario. We get the parochialism of the club game with the carrot for the players of playing themselves in to the regional team for HC.

I would also have McBryde to coach the NW side, Howley and Edwards to coach 1 each of the south teams.

I just don't think too many people are interested in the Rabo. There are virtually no travelling fans, no history, few rivalries and extra costs of the travel every other week.

If the Liberty does increase then you have 2 stadiums in South Wales of 30k and 27k (CCS) which we could use just for these occasions and I am sure the football clubs would go for that as there would be less week on week damage. North play at say Wrexham.