Dragons keen for Newport County to groundshare Rodney Parade

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Newport Gwent Dragons chairman Martyn Hazell has confirmed that the Welsh rugby regional team are in negotiations to allow football side Newport County to groundshare at Rodney Parade.

County's Spytty Park pitch has been called "not fit for purpose" by their chairman, Chris Blight.

It is not yet clear whether County will seek to play all their home games at Rodney Parade or just a select few.

"We're in the initial stages of negotiations," Hazell told BBC Wales.

"If we can accomodate them we will as it helps the town out.

"It helps the soccer team out and helps the rugby team out... but rugby would take the first choice on fixtures and everything else.

"We wouldn't get a tremendous lot of money out of it but it all helps, all finances in the time as we are now helps."

Both Newport Gwent Dragons and Welsh Premiership side Newport play at Rodney Parade, which has a capacity of 11,000.

However, Hazell does not think that having three teams sharing Rodney Parade will be a problem: "Our ground staff are pretty good, I think the pitch can put up with it.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/17818295?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

AlynDavies wrote:and at least if I decide to play Newport on Football Manager 2012 then I will at least have a big stadium to play in!

It's been given the go ahead by the looks, so you have that option now . Just needs official confirmation from the football league or whatever.

This could be a good move for all teams. As mentioned in the reports, it's extra revenue generated for the Bisley stand which is where the big money is coming in to pay off it's debt.

http://www.newportgwentdragons.com/newsarticle.aspx?n=21421

http://www.southwalesargus.co.uk/sport/9739257.Newport_County_to_play_at_Rodney_Parade_for_the_next_three_years/?ref=mmpg

Good source of secondary income for the Dragons. Hopefully the pitch will hold up.

Good source of secondary income for the Dragons. Hopefully the pitch will hold up

That's my only concern, in the summer fine, but when we hit deepest, darkest winter months with frost and heavy rain, I hope it will cope.

I'm a bit concerned too. Country have requested a ground share because of their pitch, but everyone knows that, apart from our scrum, our major Achilles heel is our pitch! We've been threatened with fines, have had to play key Heinekec Cup games at the Scarlets and Blues grouds, etc. Country may be swapping one problematic pitch for another.

Also, can anyone else think of examples of 3 teams sharing a pitch? We'll have Dragons, Newport RFC (note to Steffan: these two are different entities and play at different times!) and now the County. I can only guess that Newport RFC and County will alternate on Saturdays, with the Dragons mainly playing on Fridays and Sundays. If we're playing Friday, then one day recovery for the pitch from a pro rugby match is not ideal for football IMO.

Griff wrote:I'm a bit concerned too. Country have requested a ground share because of their pitch, but everyone knows that, apart from our scrum, our major Achilles heel is our pitch! We've been threatened with fines, have had to play key Heinekec Cup games at the Scarlets and Blues grouds, etc. Country may be swapping one problematic pitch for another.

Also, can anyone else think of examples of 3 teams sharing a pitch? We'll have Dragons, Newport RFC (note to Steffan: these two are different entities and play at different times!) and now the County. I can only guess that Newport RFC and County will alternate on Saturdays, with the Dragons mainly playing on Fridays and Sundays. If we're playing Friday, then one day recovery for the pitch from a pro rugby match is not ideal for football IMO.

You would hope that the Dragons/Newport RFC could use the extra income generated by the tenant and by the Bisle stand to upgrade the pitch - otherwise as you say there could be serious problems

Good point Smirnoff, hadn't really considered that. Yes, any funds you'd hope would go towards installing under pitch heating or something similar.

Undersoil heating would be a godsend - but I'm still concerned over who'll have priority when it comes to fixtures. It would be pretty poor if County are allowed to waltz in and have first dibs on when they have the ground.

Yeah, that's also a concern for me Luckless. I hear that it's a football association rule that the football club has priority, but if they're just coming in to a ground as bit of a favour then I think they should fall in line. It would be a farce for the two rugby teams to become second in line to the football team who has just waltzed in, especially considering the realtive positions of the teams in their respective sports (1 pro rugby team in top league, 1 semi pro rugby team in second league down, 1 football team in 5th division???).

I can't imagine Newport RFC allowing Newport FC any sort of prioritisation - 1. Newport RFC own the ground 2. Newport RFC own half/most of the Dragons. 3. Newport FC won't bring a great deal of money or fans or importantly TV money.

I think the Football team gets priority is only a Football League thing (ie League 2 and up) but think there's ways around it.

apparently conference football states football must get priority,

perhaps this is an indication of how bad the dragons need to rent money and probably more so the use of corporate facilities in the bisley stand,

actually had a chance to look at the prices of the various packages, not that expensive (for a business) the most expensive package for a box being 5k for a season (roughly)

The pitch at Rodney Parade is usually excellent. I don't recall too many games being called off, before the last few seasons. The game against the Blues was just a freak of the weather, that any ground would struggle to soak up that much water. Under-soil heating is a must. I know we couldn't afford that, but maybe that would have been a better idea, before we paid a fortune for the Bisley Stand to be half empty. We won't fill it next year, or get the corporates in, as the product on the pitch is dreadful.
The County will benifit from the atmosphere that the stadium can create and also the location. I'm worried that they will take some disillusioned Dragons supporters too. Saturday afternoon kick offs will appeal to many.
In terms of the state of the pitch. You have to look at just how many games the County play. 23 league games, FA Trophy, FA Cup and pre'season friendlies. It could be around 35. Add to that Newport RFC and the Dragons and it could get messy!

Very messy considering you could have 3 games on a weekend!

And although the Blues game was a freak downpour, the pitch does get a little boggy in heavy rain - playable but a bit messy

County play quite a few mid week games too!!