15 Jun 2025 11:49:33
Apologies for bringing this up again. Stadium expansion. Most of us know the pros and cons so I'm not going there. I think the deal breaker is for example, one podcast mentioned about £100 mill would be needed. Some will say a loan agreement would make this do-able. But look how Arsenal suffered on the field for a few years post Emirates. My worry would be our finances would be channeled to paying the loan off to the detriment of the team for post expansion years. Thoughts Bhoys ?.

1.) 15 Jun 2025
15 Jun 2025 12:03:39
Hi all hope you are well. I think it is a no brainer to expand now. It will only get more expensive as time goes on. Heard on a few podcasts that some foundation and structural work is still from the original 1929 build.

If capital is the reason not to, we could do a share issue to raise the money or part of it. I think it would also pay for itself with selling season books and revenue from additional boxes restaurants and bars that it could hold. Imagine a space where we could go to earlier on match days instead of hanging about outside in the rain.
I'm not in any hope though. I can't even get a screen put up to replace the broken one in the south west corner as we can't see the big screens because the south stand roof juts out.

2.) 15 Jun 2025
15 Jun 2025 12:18:20
Guys we still have the "hotel project" as well, IF, and yes a big IF, we go ahead with stadium expansion surely it's a no brainer to incorporate hotel in plans also, a ready made income stream on tap, yes it will be expensive but surely club could look at some kind of sponsorship.

3.) 15 Jun 2025
15 Jun 2025 12:41:13
Wouldn't want to have sponsorship - want Celtic to be Celtic instead of having a name like what St Mirren or Livingston has. It loses the identity of who we are.

4.) 15 Jun 2025
15 Jun 2025 13:12:34
I am as fond of the stadium extension and hotel building as the next one, however now is not the time . After showing at long lost, a decent European campaign we must concentrate on keeping and building on our little bit of European success, until we are fighting for quarter finalist on a regular basis .
Then we should maybe think of putting into action the stadium/ hotel building.

5.) 15 Jun 2025
15 Jun 2025 14:11:41
It's got to be done. With the cash reserves we have. Half of it along with borrowing and maybe naming rights would see it become doable. Maybe this is what the board have been saving up for Putting it off for another 5/ 10 years is just going to make the issue worse and far more expensive.

6.) 15 Jun 2025
15 Jun 2025 15:19:14
@9iar — The Arsenal comparison is not really fair because they built an entirely new stadium in London, which involved very large costs and significant loan repayments.

If we rebuilt the Main Stand instead, increasing capacity along with state of the art media, corporate, player, and fan facilities, and made it UEFA compliant to host finals, then even with a 10 year loan, we would still generate a healthy profit each season while repaying it.

Once the loan is paid off, the extra income would be substantial. On top of that, we have close to 20,000 people on the waiting list for season tickets and money in the bank, so this project would carry relatively low risk.

7.) 15 Jun 2025
15 Jun 2025 15:37:00
I'd love to see a brand new development;- stadium, hotel, museum etc all.

That would take vision, investment and likely naming rights etc All of which is unlikely to occur with our current board.

Whether that will take place in my lifetime or not, time will tell.

☘️ ☘️ ☘️.

8.) 15 Jun 2025
15 Jun 2025 17:59:07
How much did Arsenal get for Highbury . Surely they must have got a decent sum that offset some of the building costs .
There is no comparison between Arsenal’s turnover and ours . I want a strong settled Celtic team, we need to forget about Champions League if we are upgrading stadium . Our long dry period was when we upgraded 3/ 4 s of stadium in 90’s.

{Ed007's Note - Arsenal made about £30 million on the Highbury property deal. They took out a £130m loan to build flats/houses and when they were all sold it totalled about £160m.}

9.) 15 Jun 2025
15 Jun 2025 20:12:15
I am not sure I agree weedes. We would not need to forget about champions league if we done it. The reason I say that is the extra revenue would allow us to service the debt and also increase our revenue. There would only be one season that would not be the case due to the main stand being closed while work was being carried out. However, we could negate that by either locating to Hampden or murrayfield for a season. That being said my preference would be to stay at Celtic park.