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On this day: Wasps given go-ahead for 30m takeover of Coventry stadium
By PA
Wasps were given the go-ahead for a £30million takeover of the Coventry Building Society Arena on this day in 2014.
Coventry City Council voted unanimously to accept a proposal from the rugby union Premiership club to secure the future of the troubled stadium.
The 32,600-capacity arena, which opened in 2005, had been built primarily to serve Coventry City Football Club.
However, the Sky Blues fell into financial difficulties and later administration amid a protracted and complicated rent dispute with stadium operating company Arena Coventry Limited.
The football club even moved out of the stadium, then known as the Ricoh Arena, and played at Northampton’s Sixfields for a period during 2013 and 2014.
Wasps agreed to purchase ACL, which was jointly owned by the council and the Alan Edward Higgs charity, and the deal was completed the following month.
It secured a permanent home for the rugby club after 12 years as tenants of Wycombe Wanderers at Adams Park.
“We are very excited to be in a position to fulfil this ambition and to be able to move to the Ricoh Arena – it is an outstanding arena in a truly fantastic city,” read a Wasps statement, which acknowledged it would be an “unsettling” period for supporters.
Coventry returned to the stadium and played as tenants of Wasps until further problems led to a second move, this time to Birmingham’s St Andrews, in 2019. They moved back to the arena this season.
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Latest Comments
This is true.
But perhaps because rugby is Australia’s fourth (or worse) most popular sport, there is just no coaching talent good enough.
It’s interesting that no players from the Aussies golden era (say between 1987 - 2000) have emerged as international quality coaches. Or coaches at all.
Again, Australians are the problem methinks. Not as interested in the game. Not as interested to support the game. Not as interested to get into the game.
And like any other industry in the world - when you don’t have the capabilities or the skills, you import them.
Not difficult to understand really.
Go to commentsi think Argentina v France could be a good game too, depending on which Argentina turns up. The most difficult to call is Scotland Australia.
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