Spurs ahead in stadium stakes

Spurs’ state-of-the-art stadium is the envy of the Premier League and has been widely considered one of the best venues in Europe since it opened in April 2019 — after a three-year build — at a cost of £1.2billion ($1.6bn).

The Emirates, now nearly 20 years old, remains a spectacular ground in its own right, and one of the best in England, but it has aged quickly over the past six years due to the competition it faces from the blue-and-white part of north London.

Whether it is hosting the biggest music artists, annual NFL matches, boxing events or housing the F1 Drive — an electric go-karting track — under the South Stand, Spurs’ stadium is light years ahead of Arsenal’s home.

As part of their agreement with Islington Council, Arsenal can host six non-football events attended by more than 10,000 people per calendar year. Only three of these are allowed to be music concerts.

Spurs, on the other hand, can host up to 30 non-football events. That is an increase on the 16 Haringey Council’s Planning Committee previously permitted them to stage after the club were granted permission to increase the cap in December last year. Under the original agreement, music concerts were limited to a maximum of six.

As part of the new agreement between the club and Haringey Council, there is no longer a cap on the number of such gigs they can host, so long as it remains within their limit of 30. When it comes to boxing, however, the stadium is only allowed to stage two events a year.

An advantage Tottenham have over the rest of the Premier League is that they can host such events during the football calendar, due to their retractable pitch. This is a feat of engineering now replicated by Real Madrid as part of their renovation of the Bernabeu, and a reason why Arsenal have to wait until the summer before hosting non-football shows.

The powers that be at Arsenal, most notably their American owners the Kroenke family, have been giving some thought to what could be done at the Emirates from a redevelopment standpoint as they seek to maximise the club’s revenue streams. There will be multiple options on the table in terms of increasing the capacity and modernising and digitising the stadium experience, but, as it stands, there is no formal plan.

The big question for Arsenal on this front is how big and how far they want to go when it comes to redevelopment. They are constrained by the space available at the site so, realistically, they have to either build up or dig down.