Independent Leyton Orient Forum

Interesting as far as it went. No mention of a new ground, which Nigel has said is the basis for new investment. I assume that still stands.
Good to note MD expects the process to be concluded relatively soon.
Finally this season the play offs is now our minimum expectation, with automatic promotion the aim, albeit a tough ask.

Always good to see this sort of stuff about. Gives us supporters confidence that we are being well managed as a club. A clear update on what it all means.

No essential, but it would be nice to know if the new investor is an individual, a consortium, or a company.

Interesting interview and to hear what Devlin had to say.

Real Al wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 10:05 am No essential, but it would be nice to know if the new investor is an individual, a consortium, or a company.

In the original announcement it was mentioned a 'group'.

From what has been mentioned by others, sounds like it's the consortium that had a stake in Paris FC.

Real Al wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 10:05 am No essential, but it would be nice to know if the new investor is an individual, a consortium, or a company.

It's an Italian with a failed TV channel.

Fellowo wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 10:39 am

Real Al wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 10:05 am No essential, but it would be nice to know if the new investor is an individual, a consortium, or a company.

In the original announcement it was mentioned a 'group'.

From what has been mentioned by others, sounds like it's the consortium that had a stake in Paris FC.

I totally missed that.

Would that group be LVMH? They've taken over the Orient Express brand, so either people have confused the two, or that's a remarkable bit of cross-branding.

Hopefully that will mean Moët replacing the woeful Sheps in the bars.

Nothing you wouldn’t expect him to say in there really.

Only new news is that Richie has met them and is on board - that’s really positive.

What I fail to understand is this;-
Why would Orient want a new ground built costing billions? Brisbane Rd is well situated for the Central line,,bus routes and overground trains and in the heart of the community.
Surely if big money has to be spent to increase capacity, we should be looking at other options.
e.g Two-tier stands North and South and improvements to the East stand. This could give us space for at least 2-3000 more people if not more. Call me old-fashioned, but I used to stand on the North terrace in the 60's when I believe the ground capacity was ca. 30,000.

Crisby wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 12:17 pm What I fail to understand is this;-
Why would Orient want a new ground built costing billions? Brisbane Rd is well situated for the Central line,,bus routes and overground trains and in the heart of the community.
Surely if big money has to be spent to increase capacity, we should be looking at other options.
e.g Two-tier stands North and South and improvements to the East stand. This could give us space for at least 2-3000 more people if not more. Call me old-fashioned, but I used to stand on the North terrace in the 60's when I believe the ground capacity was ca. 30,000.

Billions NO, millions yes, It would also cost millions to add another tier onto the North and South stands (don't forget the South stand has flats behind it). You also have to take into account the money to be spent on redevelopment against the additional bums on seats 2-3,000 extra seats imho opinion would not be worth the millions needed to be spent.

Hopefully the investment will take us to the next level and who knows beyond.

Onwards and upwards.

Crisby wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 12:17 pm What I fail to understand is this;-
Why would Orient want a new ground built costing billions? Brisbane Rd is well situated for the Central line,,bus routes and overground trains and in the heart of the community.
Surely if big money has to be spent to increase capacity, we should be looking at other options.
e.g Two-tier stands North and South and improvements to the East stand. This could give us space for at least 2-3000 more people if not more. Call me old-fashioned, but I used to stand on the North terrace in the 60's when I believe the ground capacity was ca. 30,000.

Nigel has said before they’ve explored every possibility re Brisbane Road and nothing stacks up. We had to go through that process anyway to satisfy Waltham Forest council that staying put is not an option.
If we wish to compete at a higher level then a new ground with a significant increase in capacity is a must
I think we are looking at minimum 17,000 capacity, with the ability to add a further 5,000 onto that.

Just to add no Chance Brisbane Road could ever hold 30,000 again. Bazza’s housing estate to paid to that.
To be fair, at the time the prospect of selling out 9,000 odd seats every match looked remote, let alone double that. It was filed under ‘a nice problem to have’.
No doubt Bazza is relishing the prospect of turning the rest of Brizzy road into flat, including the obligatory small bit of greenery around the centre circle.

It would cost £20 million+ to add 1000 seats to the East Stand and that's on a ground Hearn owns, it's throwing good money after bad.

If we want to free ourselves from the albatross Hearn put on the club with the ever increasing rent and improve our capacity and commercial income we need to move elsewhere.

Still hoping there's opportunity with the Hockey stadium, that has always looked the ideal space for the club

Crisby wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 12:17 pm What I fail to understand is this;-
Why would Orient want a new ground built costing billions? Brisbane Rd is well situated for the Central line,,bus routes and overground trains and in the heart of the community.
Surely if big money has to be spent to increase capacity, we should be looking at other options.
e.g Two-tier stands North and South and improvements to the East stand. This could give us space for at least 2-3000 more people if not more. Call me old-fashioned, but I used to stand on the North terrace in the 60's when I believe the ground capacity was ca. 30,000.

I think NT has said before he would prefer to retain Brisbane Road as I think most fans would too. Unfortunately the numbers don’t stack up and the room needed to expand just doesn’t exist.

I trust NT to navigate us through this.

Those hockey facilities are in an odd corner of land, and they've been sited within that a bit haphazardly too. I reckon you could fit a stadium in the car park/unused space, but there'd be no room for a hotel, conference centre etc.

The only way to fit those in would be to raze the hockey facilities, but it doesn't sit well with me that we would trample all over someone else.

Real Al wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 10:05 am No essential, but it would be nice to know if the new investor is an individual, a consortium, or a company.

Well, the "investor" is repeatedly referred to in the singular in this video.

Real Al wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 2:56 pm Those hockey facilities are in an odd corner of land, and they've been sited within that a bit haphazardly too. I reckon you could fit a stadium in the car park/unused space, but there'd be no room for a hotel, conference centre etc.

The only way to fit those in would be to raze the hockey facilities, but it doesn't sit well with me that we would trample all over someone else.

There's plenty of room for all that.

Good job we didn't worry about trampling all over Leyton FC when we first moved to our current site, I guess?

I'm still traumatised by that

Crisby wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 12:17 pm What I fail to understand is this;-
Why would Orient want a new ground built costing billions? Brisbane Rd is well situated for the Central line,,bus routes and overground trains and in the heart of the community.
Surely if big money has to be spent to increase capacity, we should be looking at other options.
e.g Two-tier stands North and South and improvements to the East stand. This could give us space for at least 2-3000 more people if not more. Call me old-fashioned, but I used to stand on the North terrace in the 60's when I believe the ground capacity was ca. 30,000.

£40million for 1500 extra seats in the East stand isn't enough. Rebuilding the West dstand isn't happening due to costs of knocking down & rebuilding would cost more than £40 mill on the east.
Can't go higher in North & South

Real Al wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 2:56 pm The only way to fit those in would be to raze the hockey facilities, but it doesn't sit well with me that we would trample all over someone else.

I couldn't care less, the Olympic committee were happy for WHU to trample over Orient when the stadium went up, let's be ruthless and sod everyone else

gshaw wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 2:25 pm It would cost £20 million+ to add 1000 seats to the East Stand and that's on a ground Hearn owns, it's throwing good money after bad.

If we want to free ourselves from the albatross Hearn put on the club with the ever increasing rent and improve our capacity and commercial income we need to move elsewhere.

Still hoping there's opportunity with the Hockey stadium, that has always looked the ideal space for the club

It will cost the club £100m plus building an 18,000 seater that they’ll never sell out and saddle the club with that debt.

Bandy Legs wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 3:26 pm

Crisby wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 12:17 pm What I fail to understand is this;-
Why would Orient want a new ground built costing billions? Brisbane Rd is well situated for the Central line,,bus routes and overground trains and in the heart of the community.
Surely if big money has to be spent to increase capacity, we should be looking at other options.
e.g Two-tier stands North and South and improvements to the East stand. This could give us space for at least 2-3000 more people if not more. Call me old-fashioned, but I used to stand on the North terrace in the 60's when I believe the ground capacity was ca. 30,000.

£40million for 1500 extra seats in the East stand isn't enough. Rebuilding the West dstand isn't happening due to costs of knocking down & rebuilding would cost more than £40 mill on the east.
Can't go higher in North & South

Where are you pulling £40m for 1,500 from?

They can rebuild that stand and add at least 3,000 seats. Move the family stand and make that end safe standing, that will add even more capacity

BiggsyMalone wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 4:12 pm Where are you pulling £40m for 1,500 from?
They can rebuild that stand and add at least 3,000 seats. Move the family stand and make that end safe standing, that will add even more capacity

Devlin said it directly, I remember £20-30 million to add 1000 more seats as the reason why it's financially unviable

You can't do much with the North and South due to the flats behind the stands, another thing of Hearn's doing

BiggsyMalone wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 4:12 pm

Bandy Legs wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 3:26 pm

Crisby wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 12:17 pm What I fail to understand is this;-
Why would Orient want a new ground built costing billions? Brisbane Rd is well situated for the Central line,,bus routes and overground trains and in the heart of the community.
Surely if big money has to be spent to increase capacity, we should be looking at other options.
e.g Two-tier stands North and South and improvements to the East stand. This could give us space for at least 2-3000 more people if not more. Call me old-fashioned, but I used to stand on the North terrace in the 60's when I believe the ground capacity was ca. 30,000.

£40million for 1500 extra seats in the East stand isn't enough. Rebuilding the West dstand isn't happening due to costs of knocking down & rebuilding would cost more than £40 mill on the east.
Can't go higher in North & South

Where are you pulling £40m for 1,500 from?

They can rebuild that stand and add at least 3,000 seats. Move the family stand and make that end safe standing, that will add even more capacity

gshaw wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 4:18 pm

BiggsyMalone wrote: ↑Sat Feb 22, 2025 4:12 pm Where are you pulling £40m for 1,500 from?
They can rebuild that stand and add at least 3,000 seats. Move the family stand and make that end safe standing, that will add even more capacity

Devlin said it directly, I remember £20-30 million to add 1000 more seats as the reason why it's financially unviable

You can't do much with the North and South due to the flats behind the stands, another thing of Hearn's doing

As stated by gshaw.
I remember it was a lot of £'s for not many seats.
GShaws figures are probably more correct.

The club announced this either close season or a bit later. As for safe standing, it's 1 for 1 so no increase

I've just listened to Mark's interview and I'm reassured that Nigel would be staying on the board . After what happened with the previous regime I feel a little bit hesitant.