UK football club reveals brand new £4m stadium plans | Football | Sport

A football club which has been without a permanent home for four years has revealed plans for a new £4million stadium. Gorleston Football Club wants to return to Gorleston Recreation Ground in Norfolk, where its teams played for almost a century. The plans include an artificial 3G pitch, a spectator stand, clubhouse, community centre, cafe, grass pitches and a new car park.

The club is working with Great Yarmouth Borough Council on the project, with the authority owning the site, and agreeing to lease it to the club for 75 years. However, the scheme still needs planning approval before work can begin, and the application is expected to go before councillors in the coming months. The club, nicknamed the Greens, has been without a home in the town since leaving Emerald Park in 2022. It was forced to leave after the site’s owners decided to turn the land into housing, leaving it to play home matches elsewhere.

The men’s first team played at Lowestoft Town FC during the 2022-23 season before later moving to The Wellesley in Great Yarmouth. Club bosses say the £4million scheme would bring Gorleston FC back to its traditional home while also creating new facilities for the wider community.

Vice-chairman Graham Hacon said the plan was about more than football.

He said: “The misconception is this is all about football. It’s not — it’s about putting a community hub at the centre of one of the most deprived areas of Gorleston.

“Moving there is about putting something back into the community that we’ve served for over 100 years.”

The club has said the new site would provide more space for young players and local residents, as well as giving supporters a proper home ground again.

But the plans have also divided opinion locally, with some neighbours worried the development could reduce public green space, increase noise and make parking worse, the BBC reports.

Campaigner Chrissie Harris, who is part of a group opposing the scheme, said: “This is our community park, our town park, and it’s important to us. We feel, as a community, we haven’t really been involved in what is happening here.”

She said the group was not against football, but wanted other park users to be considered.

Barry Gravenell, a Great Yarmouth First county councillor for Gorleston, said he supported the club coming home but believed the plans needed balance.

He said: “I’m fully supportive of building the stadium here, but taking over too much of the recreation ground is not good, in my opinion.”

He also warned that parking in the area was already a “nightmare”.

However, Daniel Candon, Conservative cabinet member for growth, has backed the project, saying Gorleston FC has a deep connection with the town and should have its home ground there.

He added: “There is also a great community aspect to have such a facility there for the local and wider community to use.”