Ashton: Cobbold Stand Redevelopment Medium to Long-Term Desire Thursday, 6th Apr 2023 10:52 Blues CEO Mark Ashton has spoken about how a new Cobbold Stand might look but reiterated that its redevelopment is a medium-to-long-term plan. The Cobbold Stand is the oldest at Portman Road having been opened in 1971 and Ashton said soon after taking charge of the club in June 2021 that it will ultimately be replaced. Over the weekend, plans of the current Sir Bobby Robson Stand from 20 years ago billed as the new Cobbold Stand were circulating on social media as an April Fool, although back at that time there were very real thoughts of the Cobbold being redeveloped along those lines. “There is no timeline at the moment,” Ashton said at last night’s Fans’ Forum. “I’ve said this time and time again, we’re working on a master plan with the local authority on the stadium and the land around the stadium. “I think the reality is that if we did, and it’s still an if but I think the likelihood is that at some point we would work towards rebuilding the Cobbold Stand, it would certainly need to go back across the road. “And there are different ways in which you can do that, you can cantilever across the road, you can substructure on the other side of the road, you could tunnel across. There are wide-ranging ways that you could do that. But that will all link to what facilities we intend to put into that stand. “What I would say is that that’s very much in its infancy. Someone showed me some drawings on social media that had been circulated on social media over the last week or so, ignore them, someone’s just flying a kite, it won’t look like that. “Regarding whether it should be one tier, that’s a really interesting point. One of the things we debate in the stadium is atmosphere, noise and the Tannoy system and I don’t think the two tiers help us around the stadium it’s a little bit disjointed. “I’m a fan of a one-tier stand but the reality is that that depends on the infrastructure and the facilities that we’re going to put into that stand. “It’s a medium-to-longer term desire but, and I’ve said this before, we have to look at how the whole stadium works in its entirety. “It’s something that we’re definitely thinking about and we’re working in conjunction with the local authority and highways around the road, the infrastructure and facilities that they want to build behind Portman Road but it’s important that we don’t get penned in, that we have the space to build there as and when we want, and potentially increase capacity.” Ashton was also asked whether the club would change its name should Ipswich become a city. “I’m not going to comment on it because we’re in consultation with the council, with the elected authorities and we’ll work in partnership with them,” he said. “I think the reality is that when all parties are ready, there’ll be a joint-announcement on that, but I think Town fans can be rest assured that I would never do anything to be disrespectful to the heritage and tradition of this football club, so read into that whatever you may.” The Blues’ CEO also said that the club is in talks regarding the final game of the season at Fleetwood being beamed back to Portman Road, as was the case with the Cambridge match. “We’re discussing that at the moment, we’re formally allowed to do one more, we’re only allowed two per season,” he said. “We would need to make formal representation to the EFL and the broadcasters to do that and I think we’ll make that decision over the next week or so, but it’s certainly a strong possibility.”
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