±«Óătv

Tell you what I am bored with, Matty. Is the sloppy and biased journalism that is churned out on this subject, largely by the ±«Óătv and Evening Standard (yes they have to give it away these days).

Where is your source for stating that Spurs displayed "a stunningly display of top-flight arrogance" or even that they asked Palace to keep quiet until after the OPLC decision? Mr Parish is not "overly miffed" because he is on record (hey, Matty there an interesting concept for you - checking your facts) as being interested in working with Spurs (as are the local council).

As to Spurs ÂŁ25m "gesture already dismissed by the athletics lobby as woefully inadequate", well no. Certainly opinion in the athletics world is divided between those you see the "athletics legacy" having to be honoured at Stratford, and those who believe that Crystal Palace represents a better future. But, of course, the Stratford athletics lobby are not an unbiased group, as you disingenuously suggest.

At the end of the day, as a Londoner, the only criteria must be an independent financial scenario, where the financial risks to taxpayers, both now and in the future are at an absolute minimum. For the life of me I can only see this being a Spurs solution. Anything else is fantasy.

Matt, the kind of journalism being practised by the ±«Óătv and ES does a massive disservice to your profession (already down there with politians and estate agents) and to the hard pressed taxpayers of London, already penalised for the Olympics being held in our great city.

The main reason why this long drawn out affair is boring everybody is because the whole bidding process is fundamentally flawed. Therefore any serious debate on the subject inevitably gets dragged around in meaningless circles. It is not helped by the standard (no pun intended) of journalism on the topic.

The OPLC have two main criteria: (A) commercial viability and (B) athletics legacy.

The problem is that these 2 ideals are diametrically opposed.

Athletics does not and never has made money. Equally well, the more the football club concedes to the athletics lobby (ie keeping the track), the less commercially viable their business plan becomes.

Spurs have actually tried to solve the problem by offering two separate stadia, where the two ideals need not come into inevitable conflict with each other. West Ham's bid is a total fudge. They have no business case for a 60k stadium, with or without a track. They are laden with debt and will need further public money to carry out their scheme. The athletes can only use the stadium when West Ham are out of season. I cannot believe this plan is receiving serious consideration.

I am very sceptical of CPFC's involvement. They too are a penniless, struggling club likely to be relegated (to the third tier in this case). They too have no business case for a larger ground. If you can't see this (and the timing of it) as a cynical ploy by their Chesney Hawkes lookalike chairman to get his pound of flesh, then you must be very naive. I have more sympathy for Barry Hearn and Orient, but they will settle out of court with whoever wins. Hearn has already stated he prefers Spurs to West Ham because they won't need to offer cheapo tickets to try to half-fill the ground.

The whole reason why the government have gone to market in this way is to get this toxic asset off their books. You can't go cap in hand to a private football business, and then complain of arrogance when that football club behaves like like a football business during the negotiations.

Let them just go back to the original plan of upkeeping a 25k athletics stadium to further drain the public finances, and see how the taxpayers and the conservative government like it.

This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.

As a follow up to my previous post may I also say that this article is in keeping with the ±«Óătv's flawed, cosy coverage of the Olympics in the six years since we won the bid.

There has been little to no scrutiny of Lord Coe and his cronies in the last government's disastrous, oblivious-to-the-reality, decision making where it came to the Olympic Stadium. Perhaps half a billion of public funds have been squandered on a pipe-dream and the ±«Óătv in the main has just nodded it through.

In particular I have issue with the ±«Óătv's sport department, who as at Wimbledon, the Grand National and any of a host of national sporting events, cuddle up to the organisers to the detriment of their critical faculties.

I believe this is because the ±«Óătv Sport has a stake in the Games being a success just as much Lord Coe does.

This may be understandable, but in my opinion it is against the spirit and the letter of the ±«Óătv charter.

Matt Slater writes:

"Give the stadium to Spurs and you put the mockers on Palace's return to their historic home in Crystal Palace Park;"

Which implies that were Spurs not to get the OS, Crystal Palace would get the CP athletics facility. The truth is that CP have a long way to go before their stadium plan gets even close to reality.

Matt Slater writes:

"give it to Spurs or West Ham and you probably force Orient to contemplate a beggar-thy-neighbour move of their own."

West Ham propose to slash ticket prices to the level Leyton Orient sell at. Spurs promise to keep prices at the Premier League norm. The impacts are not equal, but it seems to be implied that they are.

The reason that West Ham can afford to put Leyton Orient out of business is because they're receiving a public subsidy in order to do so.

Matt Slater writes:

"This is not the blog to lay out the respective rights and wrongs of Tottenham's and West Ham's claims on the ÂŁ500m showpiece but it boils down to a choice of the least bad option: knock down a publicly-funded building after a month's use and trash our reputation in global sport, or give a publicly-funded building to a private company and pray it doesn't give it back to us."

But I believe the blog does through implication lay out the respective rights and wrongs, perhaps betraying some favouritism to the notion that athletics should be kept at the Olympic Park?

Matt Slater writes:

"...knock down a publicly-funded building after a month's use and trash our reputation in global sport"

But this building was always going to be knocked down. The bid plan was precisely about knocking it down. None of the above ground structure was supposed to remain. Indeed we spent double what we should have spent on the stadium precisely so that we could knock it down. There is no special knocking down going to happen.

Why has the article chosen to ignore this? Why characterise this as an evil of the Spurs option, rather than acknowledging that it was always part of the plan?

Matt Slater writes: “and trash our reputation in global sport"

This was Lord Coe's line but Lord Coe is not an impartial commentator on this issue? Why present his view as your own?

Matt Slater writes:

"Barry Hearn, the pub sports impresario, would probably prefer Spurs..."

But Barry Hearn does not “probably prefer Spurs” He’s on the record as definitely, 100% preferring Spurs.

Matt Slater writes:

"Spurs, as their traditional north London support does not clamber all over Orient's in quite the same way as West Ham's.

There is also the terrifying prospect - for Hearn, anyway - of West Ham dishing out thousands of cheap tickets to local youngsters and floating fans in order to fill their new 60,000-seat stadium."

Spurs and West Ham are equally well represented in Leyton Orients catchment area, so this is not a distinguishing feature between the two options. Barry Hearn has been clear about the issue and it’s one of ticket pricing. This isn't an "also" issue as presented above, it is by a street the most important issue.

Matt Slater writes (of Spurs): "a stunning display of top-flight arrogance", as regards the negotiations with Crystal Palace, but this lacks balance, and in my opinion betrays the authors feelings on the subject of the Olympic stadium bid from Spurs.


Finally, Matt Slater has sought to portray equal and opposite sides of a coin which on one side, according to him, sees Leyton Orient facing equal threat from Spurs and West Ham and on the other side sees plucky Palace being prevented their journey to the sun-lit uplands of a new Stadium in their spiritual home.

The reality is quite different to this. The scales are balanced between on the one hand West Ham’s proposal which would kill off Leyton Orient with cheap, Premier League tickets, subsidised by Newham Council and on the other hand, a speculative, locally-opposed punt by a South London Club in no threat of extinction and with little chance of success, but which would be completely scuppered by Spurs’ redeveloping the athletics facility at CP.

It is curious, but in keeping with the general tenor of the ±«Óătv’s reporting on this issue, that an article which purports to have no axe to grind, should so clearly favour in tone and content, one bidder over another.

Another rubbish blog by one Matt Slater.
I just hope the ±«Óătv come to their senses and lay off all these two bob journo's and start giving us value for money.
You already have the olympics ±«Óătv so u don't have to keep sucking up to Coe , why don't you start asking him why he wasted so much public money , in building a legacy that will sink Newham council and West Ham within 10 years.

I think its a very good point. Forget the two big "ego's"! There are other clubs future at risk too.
Levy / Sullivan / Gold are all thinking of their greedy belly's.
Another little club not far away is Dag & Red, and also, not distant but Southend. I believe at the beginning of season, when fixtures are put together, West Ham and Southend and not allowed to play on the same day?! Cheap West ham tickets, would also influence southend catchment.
I'm starting to prefer the idea of no one getting the stadium, and Palace get the NSC.

Orient fan here. Yes, we and the club are concerned about either Big Club moving into a large stadium a 10 minute walk from our current ground. But Barry Hearn is no angel in all of this, and many Os fans are wary of his objectives.

He bought the virtual freehold off the FC a couple of years ago - an event that usually spells long term disaster for a club - to repay loans made to the club covering annual operating losses he had sanctioned since buying us in 1995. Since then he's been on record as saying he wants to sell the club, and wont put another penny in.

This is his big opportunity to secure some "compensation" in order to move Orient from its home of 73 years and allow him to redevelop the remaining bits of the site not already covered in flats and offices.

If he can pull it off, he could see the Os rehoused at somebody elses expense (maybe on the Olympic site - ironically even closer to the Olympic Stadium - or somewhere further afield if he can get around the Franchise FC rules). Then he can walk away from Orient and make a few more bob on his latest Brisbane Rd property investment as well.

I suspect the reason he has been less beligerent about the Spurs bid is that they are already more amenable to doing a satisfactory compensation deal with Hearn, while West Ham are playing hardball because they have far less funds to splash around.

Tottenham's plans are a DISGRACE and should not be given the time of day. Wasting VAST amounts of tax-payer's money, a 2-bit plan to step on another club's future (and history) by suggesting a stadium in Crystal Palace Park that will never be good enough to host international athletics meetings, especially for the derisory sum of money they say they will use to build it...and will then do it on the cheap belittling the hopes and aspirations of the UK's future athletics stars and athletics as a whole. Stepping on the toes of Leyton Orient, stealing their future supporters...not that Barry Hearn cares so long as HE gets his pockets lined with silver, albeit to the detriment of the historic club. Orient supporters will be up in arms about this when the truth materialises. And

Tottenham's arrogance is sickening.

Their jealousy of Arsenal...which has been the striving force in all this...could ruin the future of 3 other football clubs and the legacy of UK Athletics.

I can't believe that any Spurs fans think that demolishing a stadium that cost half a billion pounds after one month's use is remotely acceptable. And I thought this long before Parish declared CPFC's interest in returning to the NSC.

I am just going to stop using the ±«Óătv for any useful information. If you write these pieces to provoke reactions it certainly works. Also complained about you colleague Ed Warner and ignoring taxpayers. This is just sensationalist journalism full of emotive language and light on facts.
When you have some decent facts to present for debate please let us know.

Sorry, inadvertently called you colleague Adrian Warner, Ed Warner, my mistake.

I have little doubt that those complaining about the "standards of journalism" in this article are Spurs fans.

The implications for other clubs should be borne in mind and to be honest some of the comments on this blog are far more sloppy than the original article.

This statement - "a speculative, locally-opposed punt by a South London Club in no threat of extinction and with little chance of success" - is just completely untrue - the proposals have received positive feedback from a number of relevant quarters.

As for this statement - "I am very sceptical of CPFC's involvement. They too are a penniless, struggling club likely to be relegated (to the third tier in this case). They too have no business case for a larger ground. If you can't see this (and the timing of it) as a cynical ploy by their Chesney Hawkes lookalike chairman to get his pound of flesh, then you must be very naive."

Crystal Palace are not penniless, there is a good business case - improved facilities/opportunities for multi-use, and it has clearly been the intention of the current owners since they took over last year to move to another location and, if possible to Crystal Palace Park. I'm not even sure what the "pound of flesh" is that the person commenting is referring to.

The problem seems to be that the promise of an athletics legacy in East London as part of the Olympic bid was not properly thought through as to how it would be delivered. Spurs plans will make a mockery of that, while West Ham's plans will genuinely affect Orient. It boils down to which is the lesser of the two evils, unless another alternative could be found.

I am very sceptical of CPFC's involvement. They too are a penniless, struggling club likely to be relegated (to the third tier in this case). They too have no business case for a larger ground. If you can't see this (and the timing of it) as a cynical ploy by their Chesney Hawkes lookalike chairman to get his pound of flesh, then you must be very naive.

Naive? How naive are you to think that Palace are impoverished and have no case for a larger ground? The CPFC proposals for the park are based around a strong community club helping to improve facilities for the general public - not a desperate attempt to save money.

Are all Spurs Fans as Mad as these Guy ''Quote''

At 13:19pm on 31st Jan 2011, WongKeiMan wrote:
I am very sceptical of CPFC's involvement. They too are a penniless, struggling club likely to be relegated (to the third tier in this case). They too have no business case for a larger ground. If you can't see this (and the timing of it) as a cynical ploy by their Chesney Hawkes lookalike chairman to get his pound of flesh, then you must be very naive.

How do you know????? From what I have heard of the New Owners of CPFC, There are not short of a few bob. I Think WongKeiMan, You are the one who is NAIVE. How about Tottingham stay in N17, West Ham have to Olympic Ground and CPFC move to NSC. Easy. Everyone is Happy.

Sadly, for my club Leyton Orient, in all this talk of community legacy, there has so far been little consideration of allowing the east London legacy of Leyton Orient in its various nomenclatures of around 130 years so far to continue rather than be trashed just to prove that the Olympics itself has a legacy to leave of continued playing and spectating of organised sport (including Association Football - which does not have an Olympic event).

I am not sure that social legacies can actually be planned, but, if there is something worthwhile, in the here and now, it may evolve and so maintain and develop the good work of the current time.

As for the Premier League and its rules what astounds me is that I have seen no journalist reporting about enquiries they have made to establish exactly how in December, despite a move to the Olympic Stadium obviously being into the vicinity of Leyton Orient - such a move has been approved for either Spurs or West Ham, that is breathtaking.

Please ask some questions of those involved in taking that decision.

The greed of the premier league never ceases to amaze me. Both clubs are looking to build new stadiums and want to save themselves millions of pounds by hijacking the olympic stadium. This is about money and nothing else. Tottenham are not even from East London. All Premier League clubs are looking for new revenue streams, so they can waste more money on average football players, and their wages. Why should Athletics be disrespected and treated with such disdain? Do other sports actually exist in Britain apart from the one where 22 grown men chase a ball around a field, and then feign injury in order to get fellow professionals sent off?

The stadium will have running costs of ÂŁ5m per year after 2012. Hopefully, that could be covered by athletics events, cricket matches, concerts - maybe even some rugby. Lets not have the Olympic dream hijacked by two greedy Premier League clubs, one of which is reportedly ÂŁ100m in debt. The Olympic stadium is just going to be used and abused to help raise revenue. Surely we have more integrity in our sporting character to let ourselves be scammed like this?

@ Matt Slater: Well done for taking time to reply to mine and the other posts (most of which were rather uncomplimentary to the ±«Óătv!)

You raise the issue of retractable seating a la Stade de France - this was a real missed opportunity. Or was it? Can it be raised now, or is it too late? Could the OPLC say something like this: "Spurs, you are our preferred bidder because your finances are better than West Ham's. But we really don't want you to rip up the track. Can you spend the money which you were going to use for Crystal Palace to install retractable seats at Stratford instead?". I know that final bids are now in, but this notion of "preferred bidder" suggests that the negotiation process is not over. I assume it would be cheaper than building a whole new stadium at CP, in which case Spurs would probably be happy to do so.

In my scenario, Levy can have his seats next to the pitch and the athletics people can keep their track. CPFC can have their shiny new stadium as well (I know I have offended some of their fans with my scepticism about Parish but I note none of them disagreed with me that he is really Chesney Hawkes).

Mr Slater,
If you cannot look honestly at your article and see that it is full with highly emotive language then I am concerned.
Dare mention anything concrete like finances both capital and revenue – You are a Spurs fan.
Dare to mention where we will be in five, ten or twenty years – You are a Spurs fan.
There are some very good factual entries about dual purpose stadiums on Mr Warner’s “taxpayers blog”. Are those people raising those issues Spurs propagandists and Spurs fans? I guess so.
Somebody once said “Sport and football in particular seems to think that it can operate in a vacuum where good financial business sense doesn’t need to apply.”
Why don’t you do some serious objective analysis about the future based on the financial factual information for all concerned looking at all the options and give us an article based on that?
All the OPLC legacies will be worthless and collapse without this.
“Propaganda does not deceive the people, it merely helps them to deceive themselves”.
Eric Hoffer

palacenut wrote:
" How about Tottingham stay in N17, West Ham have to Olympic Ground and CPFC move to NSC. Easy. Everyone is Happy."

Everyone except for LOFC!!!!

There is of course a third option, the one where The OS is not taken over by either of these 'big' clubs, as either will be detrimental to LOFC, for various reasons. If West Ham get the nod, they will not be able to fill the stadium so will be doing cash incentive schemes to fill the place. This will not affect current O's fans, but we will no doubt lose out on young potential fans that would no doubt chose the more glamourous option.
If Spurs get the nod, then although they will no doubt fill the place (although that remains to be seen and a relegation in future years could change that) they will still be imposing on our patch and we would lose our identity and dont tell me that they would not steamroll over all the hard work that our community schemes have done over the years, down to the fact that they would become ANOTHER East End club. There are not enough crumbs to go around.

And what would happen to Saturday fixtures? Already we cannot play at home on the same day as West Ham. If Spurs become the third local team, when do we play? Friday nights? We tried that earlier in the season against Brentford and the crowd was poor, Still who cares about 'Little Leyton Orient' ™ ?

One of the most annoying things for me over the past few weeks, is the bickering by both Spurs and West Ham in the media, bringing in all kinds of people to state their case. I mean..... Pele for Gods sake!!!!
All of which is down to their connections, not least the potential replacement for Andy Coulson as chief of the Tory press, Mike Lee. It is just like a playground spat "I will get my brother onto you" " I will get my Dad"

The bottom line is that one of the biggest selling points of the Olympic bid was the regeneration of the East End. If this means losing one of it's two Pro Football clubs, then the bid was a lie.

Doug Harper
Leyton Orient Fans Trust
Chair

I cannot believe Spurs lack of pride. You are a north London club. You spend an awful lot of time reminding the Woolwich Arsenal that they are a Woolwich club and they are trampling on your turf.

If you go to the Olympic stadium then you will have surrendered North London to the Arsenal forever. Not only that but you will be treading on Orient and West Ham's territory, the very thing that you have complained about Arsenal doing.

Tottenham will be little better than MK Dons if they move to Stratford.

Although I do feel sorry for Leyton orient, I am more concerned about palace atm. I think spurs fans including their chairmen are deluded and arrogant.

First there was the John Bostock case, now i think there were comments that we were financially unviable, naive, no money and their chairmen has the cheek to turn our business approach away like a piece of trash and they also asked us to leave the site to them until the Olympic bid is over, who do they think they are. Also quote on here "They too have no business case for a larger ground. If you can't see this (and the timing of it) as a cynical ploy". A cynical ploy, we have been wanting to move back to the CPP before your deluded chairmen was born, also our stadium is out of date and one of the stands in two years will not live up to the health and safety standards. Reasons why we haven’t moved there before was bad financing and not enough money, but these guys are serious people with allot of money, who are planning for the future and you call us naïve, do your research before you make ridiculas statements like this.

selhurst1234 wrote:

"Although I do feel sorry for Leyton orient, I am more concerned about palace atm."

Well there os room for all concerned fans to get together and fight this. It is not the 1970's anymore and fans united actually DO make a difference

The stadium is in the political constituency of West Ham. So why exactly are Leyton Orient, from the constituency of Leyton and Wanstead, complaining about a team moving to their actual home?!

Seems to me Orient don't even know why they are upset about this. Hearn just fears a couple of fans "turning West Ham" and has thrown his toys out of his pram. If West Ham were that attractive as a team to support, we'd be selling out the ground this season! We aren't!

As a Palace fan and a lover of football I have seen Spurs on numerous occasions, 3 times with Palace and about 5 against other clubs. I was also luckily enough to go to the Carling cup final at Wembley two years ago and watch them in the Champions League this year so I have a lot of time for them.

Reading this article and if it is true they can get lost. Crystal Palace is our home and Bromley council want to keep it this way. Therefore if this is not a ploy to put pressure on Brent Council to allow them to do what they want to White Hart Lane all 4 clubs should work together.

Proposal: West Ham and Spurs ground share without a running track, which moves to Crystal Palace as a separate stadium (paid for by Spurs & West Ham) to the football stadium for Palace or if not feasible a different location. Finally but not least West Ham and Spurs come up with a scheme to help Orient with loss of earnings and free tickets to Orient games.

OhhhhMattyMatty wrote:

"The stadium is in the political constituency of West Ham. So why exactly are Leyton Orient, from the constituency of Leyton and Wanstead, complaining about a team moving to their actual home?!"

With respect, please read the PL and Football League rules which state

"would not adversely affect Clubs (or Football League clubs) having their registered grounds in the immediate vicinity of the proposed location"
Where does it mention political boundries and what if one team moved to the edge of their boundry in which another team was on the edge of theirs?

Message 25.

++Orient don't even know why they are upset about this. Hearn just fears a couple of fans "turning West Ham" ++

The rules of the Premier and Football Leagues (one or other of which each football club is a member) talk about a club not being approved to move into the vicinity of another club if that other club will be disadvantaged.

this is nothing to do with The Olympic Stadium.

If any other club moves as near to Orient as The Olympic Stadium Orient will be disadvantaged, yet The Premier League has ALREADY given approval. I hope Barry Hearn sees them in court!

Why are West Ham proposing to leave the OS at 60,00 seats when they cant fill it and dont need them. In order to host major Athletics you only need a stadium that can take around 40,000 spectators. This reduced capacity would still tick all the boxes and prevent the cheap ticket sell off that would put Leyton Orient in jeopardy. As a supporter of Cheltenham Town ( a small club) my sympathies are firmly with the Leyton Orient fans in this and the FA must abide by its own rules first and foremost.

19. At 20:03pm on 31st Jan 2011, WongKeiMan wrote:
CPFC can have their shiny new stadium as well (I know I have offended some of their fans with my scepticism about Parish but I note none of them disagreed with me that he is really Chesney Hawkes).

WongkeiMan. You are showing your Age, I have looked up Chesney Hawkes and he looks a bit like Parrish when shut one eye and squint ish ish ish. Its say Chesney is Gay. :) for u.

Michael (26) - how about this for a proposal?

All clubs simply abide by the rules of their Leagues and don't try to move into the vicinity of an existing club. CPFC can still proceed with their plans, as they don't appear to break the League rules.

Naked greed has already done enough to ruin the game.

OhhhhMattyMatty wrote:

"The stadium is in the political constituency of West Ham. So why exactly are Leyton Orient, from the constituency of Leyton and Wanstead, complaining about a team moving to their actual home?!"

Please explain - what do the respective PARLIAMENTARY constituencies have to do with it? The logic escapes me.

Also:

"Seems to me Orient don't even know why they are upset about this. Hearn just fears a couple of fans "turning West Ham" and has thrown his toys out of his pram. If West Ham were that attractive as a team to support, we'd be selling out the ground this season! We aren't!"

Exactly! That's why you would have to offer thousands of cut price tickets to our prospective floating and new fans in order to fill the place........

At 13:19pm on 31st Jan 2011, WongKeiMan wrote:

"I am very sceptical of CPFC's involvement. They too are a penniless, struggling club likely to be relegated (to the third tier in this case). They too have no business case for a larger ground. If you can't see this (and the timing of it) as a cynical ploy by their Chesney Hawkes lookalike chairman to get his pound of flesh, then you must be very naive."

Don't ever comment on bad journalism as you did at the beginning of this post when you are willing to write utter tripe straight after.

Why act like you are up to date with current affairs when you still think Palace are skint? You aren't up to date at all.

For the record, Palace's four main owners are very rich. We have been looking into and talking about moving to the Crystal Palace park for decades and now we have a real chance to do it.

The stadium itself would be 25k seater if we are playing in League One and 40k if we stay up. There is a huge catchment area for Palace to exploit where Crystal Palace Football Club can play in er.... Crystal Palace.

Myopic viewpoints of Premier League fans really grind my gears. If you're going to have an opinion on something at least make sure it is at least partly based on fact.

I was unaware of the impact that the bid would have on Palace and Orient. As a Torquay United supporter, I hope that whatever the outcome Orient don't suffer. And as somebody who has been football mad for 20+ years, I remember hearing talk of Palace wanting to return home back when they were in the Premiership; it'd be nice to see that finally happen, too.

All in all, the whole Olympic Stadium situation just reeks of franchise football to me. To be honest, I almost hope that the final decision is stuff the lot of 'em, none of them can have it. Or, give it to the Hammers (since they're already from the area) but tell them they're not allowed to undercut Orient's business with cheap ticket schemes, or that they need to rethink the stadium's capacity. Doesn't really seem to be any good solution, let alone a perfect one.

As a Palace fan living in Milton Keynes, I have seen first hand both the damage caused to a club in re-locating, and also the animosity towards a new location and apathy within that new area. Having said that, the future potential of an MK Dons at the top level of English football is far greater than a homeless Wimbledon regardless if any football fan likes it or not.

The case of the Olympic Stadium, and the promises made on securing the games is a totally different case, and each proposal for future use should be viewed individually. In considering each proposal, the promises of keeping athletics at the stadium in one form or another seems to be of paramount importance to our credibility as a sporting nation.

Not having athletics on the site should automatically prevent even consideration of Tottenham's bid. It should seem obvious to the wheeler dealers in charge of the club at present that the majority of their fans do not want Tottenham to move from Tottenham,and I believe I read that expansion plans for their current ground had been approved? All this appears to matter little to the owners.

Simple facts: Tottenham is in North London, Stratford is in East London. It would be ridiculous to retain Tottenham as the name of the club if moving was approved, perhaps they are looking to change their name to just Spurs, to catch up with neighbours Arsenal, another place that does not exist(except on a Tube map).

The West Ham bid would seem more sensible and realistic, from a practical point of view by encompasing athletics, but even more so considering their location and tradition in the area. This should be the only bid under consideration, but I can appreciate the clash with the football regulators in respect of Leyton Orient and their future. It is a major problem and hurdle to overcome, but again I would say the West Ham bid is the only tangible football bid.

The Crystal Palace plan should be seen as an entirely separate issue, the current Crystal Palace is rundown and needs a major overhaul regardless of CPFC involvement, and should not be dangled as a carrot by a football club attempting to control the sporting future of two areas of London, neither of which they are related to or involved in.

If you mean the name Arsenal, there is no such so place, the tube station was provided and named long after the club moved from Woolwich. The same would apply to a club named Spurs.

There's a lot of talk here about Premier League tickets at League One prices - the problem there of course is that West Ham will be playing Championship football next season and that there's a very, very good chance we'll still not manage to get rid of all our tickets every week.

I'm personally against the move based on the fact that moving the club to the Olympic Stadium when we're not even in the Premier League will be a financial and public relations disaster, both for the club and for the Olympic Legacy.

One of the rules of these sorts of blogs (& "have your say" is that whenever the ±«Óătv blogger says something people disagree with, they blame the ±«Óătv for bias/sloppy journalism. They then tend to display an obvious prejudice - for a particular club or political party. We see the world from different perspectives and being belligerent with someone who doesn't share your perspective rarely wins you the argument - though it may reduce your blood pressure.
I come at this from the perspective that i was glad we won the 2012 Olympic & Paralympic Games. It's the only time we'll host anything like this in my lifetime & I am anticipating a wonderful experience. I also consider that in order to win, London made certain promises. If we are ever to hold up our heads in the international community, we need to behave with integrity and keep those promises. We're happy to lecture others about lack of morality in such matters (e.g. failed World Cup bid), but if we don't put our money and our actions where our mouth was, we're no better than anyone else.

Historically the only North London league club is surely QPR. It began in Kensal didn't it, and was in London when Tottenham was still officially in Middlesex (before that county's demise) I would have thought. Leyton Orient is more complicated. Clapton, their earlier name is in London/Middlesex but Leyton in Essex. Stratford was indeed historically originally part of West Ham - which of course was in Essex until the 1960s. Arsenal were of course from Woolwich but in fact a tiny part of Woolwich was originally north of the Thames, in Essex/Middlesex and County of London territory - before Tottenham was in London's boundaries I think.
Of the various arguments I think there can be no denying athletics' need for a quality national home is far more important than helping out Premier League clubs out of their respective predicaments. If they can splash the cash as they do on players I'd say they can afford to finance their own builds from scratch as Arsenal have done. I do wonder though if Stratford is really an ideal location for athletics - but then, is it any less accessible than South Norwood. Oh! And before anyone says it - no, I am not an Arsenal fan, in fact they are one of my least favourite London clubs.

From someone who has lived all the life on the otherside of the world in sydney australia, I read with great intrest about whom or what will happen to the stadium once the "5 ring circus leaves town". Firstly before I go on with my rave make sure you enjoy the olympics as someone stated , is something you may only have to experience once in a lifetime.
Now to this blog...... FAIR DINKUM guys.... it seems to me that it is all about greed here with certain people saying i like this propsal cause it works best, while others say this method would be better... come on guys lets stop cutting the grass and looking at the paint dry on the wall.... is certain clubs and peoples self intrest and haved little reguard for all and sundry, whose toes they crush or whose fingers they burn.... i do not support any of the clubs involved in this ( i adore southampton so i am not biased maybe crazy baracking for the saints but cest la vie) but i do feel for the underdog like leyton orient and crystal palace and someone mentioned southend and dag and red , but others got on here and said west ham this and tottenham that... they do not care about smaller clubs ( they are like politicians full of promises before an election, but once elected their memory deserts them as quick as a rat leaves a sinking ship.
For whom get to uses the olympic stadium once it has finished with its athletic usuage, lets hope that all whom the decision beckons with look at every angle. In sydney once the olympic stadium ( was made for 110,000 spectators for the olympics) has been redesigned and now holds a capacity of 80,000. the ground is now used by 2 rugby league clubs who relocated accross sydney ( Canterbury bulldogs and south sydney rabbitohs) to use the venue, Aussie rules club the sydney swans play 3 games there instead of all of them at the sydney cricket ground ( for mega dollars they play these games there), New South Wales cricket play all there 20/20 games there and one day domestic level matches there rather than the sydney cricket ground, they also have baseball and concerts to name a few events there, so the arena after the games is well used.
The stand at Stadium australia ( olympic stadium) is also able to be moved so seats and other things can be moved out so an athletics track if still going to be there could be used ( because the ground or stadium in sydney is rectagonal and the field requirements are for cricket and aussie rules is circular)
To the people who said pull it down "fair Dinkum" what alot of crap... what a waste of tax payers money for a great stadium. Lets just hope the decision makers make the decision whom uses the ground in the best interest of everybody, for all and sundry.. as for people to lose there club because of others self intrest is a shame
thats my rant ... i will look on with great intrest

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Why is this even happening now? Surely it should have been dealt with before construction even started, allowing retractable seating if the stadium was going to be used for football. The Spurs bid is an utter joke and sadly lives up to their arrogant, unpopular reputation. Spurs fans don't even want the move to happen, and I don't see any justice in the club using their big club posturing to get what they want at the expense of the Olympic 'legacy', Orient, Palace (my club) and, to a lesser extent, West Ham (I'm not convinced by their claim either but at least it makes some sense). If the Spurs plan goes ahead and proves to be an impediment to Crystal Palace FC moving to Crystal Palace Park and upgrading the facilities there it will prove to me conclusively that there is nothing else in British society that actually means anything at all other than money, status and influence.

Great to see an article about the Olympic Stadium that focusses on the effect on the smaller London clubs, rather than (if at all) as an adjunct to the Spurs vs West Ham debate.

Part of the uniqueness of the history of English football is the tapestry of big clubs and small, but the top flight is trying more and more to distance itself from the rest of the pyramid, in an attempt to hog an ever-greater proportion of the cash that's available. Spurs and West Ham should pay heed to their supporters - who have, of course, not been consulted over whether they want their club to move - and not risk destroying their uniqueness as football clubs.

The Premier League's and Football League's rules are there for a reason, and that's to prevent a member club preying on another member club. Leyton Orient have just as much right to exist as their larger neighbours, and whatever happens next has to include some measure of protection for Orient. We're not greedy, we never have been, we just ask for the right to remain an east London club that is part of the League's uniqueness.

The arrogance of Premiership football teams and many of their supporters is staggering.
I so so hope the bubble will burst soon.

Totally agree CT_Palace. Everything has a birth, life and death, and the death of the Premier League bubble and the arrogance that goes with it is long overdue. I can remember days when clubs such as Forest, Derby, Southampton and Palace too could envisage a place at the top table or in cup finals. Alas, that is no more, and the demise of 'real' competition is the start of the demise of the sport, as is the day when you fail to protect the weaker elements of society. In this case it is Palace and Orient, and they deserve the same support if not more, than the Premier League 'giants'.

BTW, I think the Olympic Stadium should have its destiny as it was intended, with no fudging of the issue because the big money clubs now start waving wads of cash. Reduce it to 25000, as originally planned, allow athletics, and other sports. i.e. if a rugby club wants to make regular use i.e. Saracens, Wasps etc. then allow them too, and also use it as a venue for the lower league and non-league play-offs and cup finals. In this way it is a legacy for the whole community and country, and not just for Spurs or West Ham fans.

Mark