Birmingham 2022: Villa Park no longer a Commonwealth Games host venue
Villa Park will no longer be a host venue at the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games.
The change is due to the anticipated early start of the football season in 2022.
With the FIFA World Cup kicking off in November that year, Aston Villa has been unable to commit to the dates required for the Commonwealth Games in July and August 2022.
Organisers said detailed assessments of venues included in the bid also revealed a number of challenges in operating Villa Park at Games time.
Meanwhile, Birmingham 2022 also announced a change in venue for netball, following the recent growth in popularity of the sport.
After an increase in its profile since Team England’s gold medal winning heroics on the Gold Coast in 2018 and England’s hosting of the Netball World Cup in July, the sport moves from the Coventry Indoor Arena to the NEC, increasing capacity.
After a routine review of venues, rugby sevens will now relocate to Coventry Stadium, the home of Wasps and Judo and wrestling will now be held on the same site in Coventry.
The venue refresh follows on from the recent announcement that Birmingham’s iconic Edgbaston Stadium is now an official venue for Birmingham 2022, after women’s cricket was added to the sports programme.
Ian Reid, chief executive for Birmingham 2022, explained the venue changes announced today: “As is common practice for all major multi-sport events, we have been considering how best to optimise the mix of venues available to us, making sure we’re being as efficient as possible in terms of usage and cost, and ensuring that we are developing a fantastic experience and showcase for the sport, the athletes, the spectators and the host city and region.
“We are delighted to be able to relocate netball into a larger venue as this sport’s profile has massively increased since the 2017 bid. We’re disappointed that Villa Park will unfortunately no longer be part of our venue portfolio, however we hope to continue working closely with Aston Villa in the run up to the Games.”
Nicola Ibbetson, chief commercial officer of Aston Villa said: “Although Villa Park will unfortunately no longer be a Games venue, we are continuing to discuss ways Aston Villa can help support Birmingham 2022 in hosting this prestigious event.”
Stuart Cain, chief executive (Venue) at Wasps said: “We’ve built a great reputation for staging top-level rugby union at the Coventry Stadium having hosted Six Nations games, European semi-final matches, as well as obviously all Wasps home games. This is a great extension and gives us the chance to work with the Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games to deliver another successful rugby tournament in the region. We’re also excited to host the wrestling and judo within the Coventry Indoor Arena, adding to the diversity of sports we’ve already accommodated at the stadium.”
The latest venue update has now been approved by the Commonwealth Games Federation’s executive board, ahead of its general assembly in Rwanda, which will see a team from Birmingham 2022 presenting an update on preparations for the event to representatives from the 71 Commonwealth nations and territories from across the globe.
