The future of Valencia’s Mestalla still uncertain

Valencia - Nou Mestalla 15.12.2014: The new Valencia owner, Singapore billionaire Peter Lim, has withdrawn a previously made statement about the completion of construction of Nou Mestalla, which is again far from being finished. At present, the Spanish club are facing enormous financial problems, so the new Mestalla has stopped being a priority. When will Valencia fans watch matches at a new stadium? They have been waiting for it for seven long years and it seems that they will wait for at least five more years, having only a stadium under construction to pass by.

Last year the club asked architect Mark Fenwick and his team to remove all insignificant features from the stadium design. As a result, the stadium capacity was decreased to 61,000 seats, unnecessary advertising boards were removed and the roof was shortened so that it will now cover only three quarters of the seats, leaving the rest open to rain. These cost-saving measures led to a significant decrease in costs – from 244 million EUR to 100 million EUR.

Although it will not be a complete solution to Valencia’s financial problems, Singapore investor Peter Lim believes that it will nevertheless prove helpful. In May Lim gained approval from the Valencia foundation and bought 70% of the club’s shares. After that he announced his intention to continue with Fenwick’s project of Nou Mestalla.

Foto: Photo: Joanbanjo (CC BY-SA 3.0)

However, the final agreement was not signed until September. Until then Lim had been negotiating with Bankia, the club’s main creditor. Nevertheless, according to El Confidencial the current agreement does not contain any mention of a guarantee, a final proposition or the stadium characteristics. It merely states a wish to open Mestalla in 2019, on the occasion of the club’s hundredth anniversary.

In order to help the club overcome their financial problems and continue with the stadium construction, Bankia has released Valencia CF from their obligation to pay off the instalments for the next three years. It is expected that within the three years Peter Lim will make investments in the team, which will subsequently be good enough to regularly take part in the Champions League and achieve some success. It should be such achievements that will help increase the club’s budget so that they will be able to pay off their debts and continue with the construction of Nou Mestalla.

Author: Jiri Vojkovsky |