Gail Richards, chief executive of Oldham Primary Care Trust said, “I am somewhat surprised by these comments, as the PCT is not currently looking for further office space.”
The initial plans for a 16,000 seater ground to be shared by the Latics and Oldham Roughyeds is still planned to go ahead although costs are estimated to be up to £80 million. Stage one would involve building a new Broadway stand which would be done within the next two years. An international hotel chain is looking at investing £10 million at the new Boundary Park site but the current owners feel that they could lose out unless the local community provide more backing.
Simon Corney explained, “We always stressed this would be a long process, but certain people have made it more difficult than we hoped. We had talks with the local health authorities and were led to believe they were fully on board. Unfortunately, this has not proved the case. I'm also disappointed at the number of local companies who have seen our plans, had the opportunity to invest and not followed it up. We wanted to keep as much as possible within Oldham so the local community would benefit from local investment, but we're having to look elsewhere. That's a shame, but it doesn't change our commitment to a new stadium. It just makes things more difficult. Some of the powers that be in this town can still effectively make or break us, but it's important to say Oldham Council are being helpful with the planning process.”
Just like a script from Dallas, an alleged letter written by Athletic director Ian Hill has suggested that TTA want to sell the club. The letter could have strong repercussions on Mr. Hill if/when the three owners of the club respond. Mr. Hill's letter said, “Due to lack of support, from any major players in the town, they (TTA) have come to the conclusion that the town lacks any aspiration to take itself forward and are looking to dispose of the club. There are a number of developers interested in purchasing the club and site, but none of them have any wish to progress with the development that we were proposing and simply wish to maximise their return which will probably mean extensive areas of housing.”
Simon Corney is still gung-ho and earlier said, “You can never say 100 per cent never, but we have no intention of going anywhere for a long time." Oldham Councillor David Hibbert said, “I do not think that would be right because it is taxpayers' money, but we said we would support the project in any other way that we could. We cannot make a commitment to that because we may not need the office space. Every project goes through periods when things do not look as certain as would be hoped. This project just needs confidence, courage and motivation to make it happen and I think the people involved at Oldham Athletic have all three. It now needs local and national business to swing behind it.”