NEWCASTLE UNITED’s proposed plans for a new stadium to replace St James’ Park have seemingly stalled as the club plans to address other business concerns first.
Newcastle United’s proposal for a new stadium has hit a roadblockCredit: Getty
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The plans were expected to propose a new ground on the site of nearby Leazes ParkCredit: Getty
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The club’s Saudi-led ownership are prioritising other aspects of the club before revisiting the plansCredit: Getty
Plans for a new 65,000-seat ground on the site of nearby Leazes Park were set to be revealed earlier this year before being delayed.
Now it seems these plans have been pushed back until the club is on more stable ground in other areas.
According to reports from the Daily Mail, the owners had prioritised other issues, namely the appointment of a new chief executive, a new sporting director and the production of a new training ground.
Headway has already been made on the list, with the club announcing David Hopkinson as their new CEO last week.
The executive has spent time working with football giants such as Real Madrid, and most recently held a role as a President and COO overseeing the business of the New York Knicks and the New York Rangers in the US.
Reports suggest Nottingham Forest sporting director Ross Wilson is in line to make the change to the North East to address the second point.
This follows the departure of incumbent sporting director Paul Mitchell, who chose to leave the club in June ahead of the summer window.
The holdup, it seems, remains on the final point, with Newcastle still unable as yet to find a suitable site for the development, having made one initial offer before negotiations fell apart.
Ground has reportedly been broken on designs for the training ground in collaboration with Populous, the architects behind Tottenham Hotspur Stadium.
The hope is to make further progress on the training centre in Autumn, but until then, it seems plans for a new stadium will remain on the back-burner.
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Calls for a new ground have grown as Newcastle look to establish themselves in the Champions League.
Their current 52,000 capacity ground will host Barcelona on Thursday as the Magpies look to get off to a flying start in the competition.
Meanwhile, we are getting rid of medical researchers and weather forecasters, even as extreme and deadly weather events become more common.
Steve Lopez
Steve Lopez is a California native who has been a Los Angeles Times columnist since 2001. He has won more than a dozen national journalism awards and is a four-time Pulitzer finalist.
You would think — based on the priorities in President Trump’s budget, tax and policy bill approved last week — that immigration is the greatest threat to our health and security.
It’s not.
But billions of dollars have been added for border and ICE agents while billions more have been trimmed from medical, climate and weather-related resources.
On Monday morning, federal agents on horseback and in armored vehicles descended on MacArthur Park in a show of force. Children playing in the park were ushered to safer ground, Mayor Karen Bass said at a news conference.
“Frankly it is outrageous and un-American that we have federal armed vehicles in our parks when nothing is going on in our parks,” Bass said, adding that she didn’t know if anyone was even detained.
“It’s a political agenda of provoking fear and terror,” she said.
The event “looked like a staging for a TikTok video,” said City Council President Marqueece Harris-Dawson.
MacArthur Park has a sizable undocumented immigrant population, and a lot of big problems to tackle — homelessness, a wide-open drug trade and gang activity. On some days areas of the park were unusable for families. First responders rolled out on overdose calls, addicts took over an alley, and merchants struggled to stay open amid all the mayhem.
In December, people sit at the corner of Alvarado Street and Wilshire Boulevard, an area known for illegal drug use in the Westlake neighborhood.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
As I found last year over the course of several months on the ground, local officials waited too long and moved too slowly in response to the long-festering crisis.
But a silly military parade isn’t going to help, unless they actually were going after undocumented drug lords — but there was no immediate evidence of that.
If the federal government wanted to help, L.A. could use more support for housing, drug interdiction and treatment. It could use a more stable and equitable economy that’s not undermined by tariff uncertainties and the president’s taunts of trading partners.
As we know in California, countless industries rely on undocumented laborers. It’s an open secret, and has been for decades, not just in the Golden State but across the nation, and yet Washington has been unable to put together a sensible immigration reform package over the years.
That’s right. Trump threatened lackey GOP Congressman, ordering the spineless ninnies to pull their support.
Every time I see a helicopter now in L.A. — and as we know, they’re like mosquitoes up there — I wonder if Trump has sent in the Air Force, with bombers coming in behind them.
My colleague Rachel Uranga recently reported that “ICE has not released data on criminal records of detainees booked into its custody.” But nonpublic data from the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, “showed about 9 out of 10 had never been convicted of a violent or property crime, and 30% have no criminal record. The most frequent crimes are immigration and traffic offenses.”
It’s nothing to warrant the terrorizing of neighborhoods and communities, nothing to warrant armed, masked agents of unknown identities and agencies roaming our streets and nabbing workers at car washes, Home Depots and restaurants.
Federal immigration agents near MacArthur Park in the Westlake area on Monday.
(Carlin Stiehl / Los Angeles Times)
It’s almost as terrifying as several other real and existential threats:
An anti-vax crackpot is in charge of the nation’s healthcare and medical research system.
Some of the leading researchers in medicine and science are leaving the country in a trend that could end up being a catastrophic brain drain.
I got an email the other day from the Social Security Administration informing me the “(SSA) is celebrating the passage of the One Big, Beautiful Bill.” I thought it was a joke at first — a satirical take on the rise of an authoritarian regime.
Meteorologists say extreme weather events like the rainstorms that led to a river surge and killed dozens of children and adults in Texas’ Hill Country over the holiday weekend are going to become more common.
Florida had a record-tying number of hurricanes in 2024 with 11 of them, and $130 billion in damage.
Wildfires destroyed thousands of homes in Southern California last year and are becoming ever-more common around the world.
Temperatures in the Mediterranean Sea smashed records for June, and scientists are warning of dire impacts on sea life and food chains.
To the president and his minions, the crisis is overblown.
It’s fake news.
And the federal government can’t be distracted from its core mission.
The week is young, and there’s no telling which L.A. neighborhood will be invaded next.
Prior to Postecoglou’s exit, Tottenham were focussed on adding greater experience to their young squad.
Among the attractions to Frank for Spurs chairman Daniel Levy was the Dane’s long-standing relationship with technical director Johan Lange.
The pair, according to sources, hold a similar view as to the profile of player required to take this team forward.
“There’s a synergy there,” said one well-placed insider.
That bodes well ahead of what will be a pivotal summer for the club.
Among the positions the club are looking to add experience is in central midfield and at centre-back given the interest from Spain in Cristian Romero, though as of yet no rival clubs have shown an indication that they are willing to match his £70million asking price.
Spurs tried and failed to sign Crystal Palace captain Marc Guehi in the summer but remain interested, though the England centre-back has options elsewhere.
Likewise, with captain Heung-min Son a target for Saudi clubs – Tottenham are closely monitoring the forward market. Intriguingly, Spurs are linked with Manchester United target Bryan Mbeumo – a key player for Frank at Brentford.
They have been interested in Crystal Palace and England attacker Eberechi Eze, who has a £68million release clause.
Tottenham are understood to be exploring whether to keep loanee Mathys Tel at the club in some capacity next season.
The club’s qualification for the Champions League should ensure a more substantial budget for Spurs to utilise in the summer market.
But there is a growing sense that owners, the ENIC Group, are taking a greater interest over the club’s operations; with that in mind it will be interesting to see how that focus impacts expenditure.
Like at most clubs, the structuring of transfers will be a key element of how freely Spurs can operate this summer given instalments for previous deals are due this summer.
There will certainly be moves to sell players, too. In addition to the uncertainty surrounding Romero and Son, midfielder Yves Bissouma’s future needs to be resolved this summer with his contract due to expire next year.
Rodrigo Bentancur is in the same boat regarding his contract, though the Uruguayan is in talks over an extension.
