Spurs Would Level Olympic Stadium

The battle to control London’s Olympic Stadium has taken another bitter twist as Tottenham Hotspur claimed bid rivals West Ham United would struggle to fill it and leave fans so far from the pitch that they wouldn’t be able to see the ball.

The north London club, one of Top 5 in English soccer, took a lot of flak after admitting that – if it won the bid to use the Stratford venue that’s been purpose-built for the 2012 Games – it wouldn’t stop at tearing up the athletics track.

It said it’d bulldoze the 80,000-capacity athletics building to make way for a 60,000-capacity purpose-built football ground.
London’s Olympic Games Organising Committee chairman Lord Coe has been very vocal about backing the West Ham bid – which would put the soccer field inside the athletics track – as the only one that meets the promise he made to deliver an athletics legacy.

Tottenham says its bid, which has the backing of U.S. entertainment giant AEG, leaves a better athletics legacy for London as it’s prepared to refurbish Crystal Palace as a 25,000-capacity athletics stadium.

Although many Spurs fans would prefer the club develop a new ground adjacent to its current home at White Hart Lane, where outline planning permission has already been granted, its board is mindful that the Stratford option works out about £200 million cheaper.

The Spurs plan has been labeled “woefully inadequate” by UK Athletics chairman Ed Warner, who is also backing the joint-bid West Ham’s made with Live Nation and Newham Council.

LN international chief ops officer Paul Latham, who supports Arsenal, Spurs’ north London rivals, said it doesn’t make sense to spend £570 million on an Olympic Stadium and then knock it down as soon as the Games have finished.

The Olympic Park Legacy Company is expected to announce a preferred bidder by Jan. 28. The final decision will be made by the government and London Mayor Boris Johnson.