WP decides to stay at Newlands

19 December 2014 - 02:03 By Craig Ray
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Lineout practice during the Stormers training session at Newlands Stadium in Cape Town. Cape Town Stadium's status as a white elephant is guaranteed after the Western Province Rugby Football Union announced it would no longer consider a move to the Green Point facility from Newlands.
Lineout practice during the Stormers training session at Newlands Stadium in Cape Town. Cape Town Stadium's status as a white elephant is guaranteed after the Western Province Rugby Football Union announced it would no longer consider a move to the Green Point facility from Newlands.
Image: GRANT PITCHER/GALLO IMAGES

Cape Town Stadium's status as a white elephant is guaranteed after the Western Province Rugby Football Union announced it would no longer consider a move to the Green Point facility from Newlands.

After three years of negotiations, this will come as a blow to the City of Cape Town, which had desperately tried to lure Western Province as an anchor tenant to the 55000-seater stadium.

Built at a cost of almost R4.4-billion for the 2010 World Cup, the stadium costs an estimated R50-million a year to maintain. Western Province was regarded as the only viable anchor tenant to help offset those costs.

"The WPRFU owns Newlands Rugby Stadium - including the ground it is built on outright - and is thereby in complete control of its own destiny. Any position for the WPRFU at the Cape Town Stadium will be as a tenant or a minority shareholder in an operating entity as the city has made it very clear the ownership will always remain that of the city," the union said.

"While selling Newlands Rugby Stadium and moving to the Cape Town Stadium would result in a significant one-off cash injection for the WPRFU, it would be financially difficult to ever own, purchase or build another stadium in the future, in all likelihood relegating Western Province to a tenant in perpetuity."

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