The 'Old Anfield' Will Live on in Superb Liverpool Ground Redevelopment

Liverpool announced on Thursday further details of their plans for a redeveloped Anfield stadium, with phase one of the project to rebuild the club's Main Stand due to begin next week.

Work is due to be completed in time for the 2016/17 season and will take Anfield's capacity to just under 54,000, up from its current 45,000 capacity. Phase two, which would involve expansion of the Anfield Road End stand, would take the capacity to close to 59,000.

That second phase, revealed by Alex Miller for This Is Anfield, will go ahead regardless of whether or not the club sells out a 54,000-seater stadium once the new Main Stand is completed.

Liverpool and owners Fenway Sports Group have identified the 60,000 mark as the "sweet spot" for development. "Sweet spot has a number of points to it: one is the cost to develop and the return on that investment," explained chief executive Ian Ayre, as per Press Association (via This Is Anfield).

Ayre has defended plans to add 3,500 new corporate hospitality seats in the new stand—doubling the current amount to 7,000.

"I don't think there’s a football club in the country who could afford to spend money on a new stand without the assistance of corporate hospitality," he explained, per the Guardian. "It will probably pay two thirds or more of the payback of this facility and that is a fact of life. You can’t find economic solutions that work in big, new stadiums that don’t have corporate."

Owners FSG are funding the new development via a £115 million interest-free loan, which will be paid off within five years of the stand being complete (via Chris Bascombe of the Telegraph).

Liverpool admit "that their primary motivation with phase one of their development is to swell their matchday revenue by an initial £20 million a year," writes Bascombe.

Chris Brunskill/Getty Images

Clearly, FSG are taking a very sensible, financially viable and business-savvy approach to expansion.

They are increasing the corporate hospitality numbers in phase one, recouping the financial return from that, then using that money to pay towards the second phase of development which will add another 5,000 general sale tickets.

As supporters, we'd all like to see more general sale tickets made available, but we must be realistic, and in this modern era of football, it's corporate business agreements that will make the money LFC require to bridge the gap between them and their competitors.

Don't forget that Anfield's capacity hasn't changed in almost two decades; Liverpool are massively playing catch-up here. The Main Stand hasn't changed since the 1970s (bar the addition of seats in the Paddock Enclosure).

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Anfield redevelopment latest: #LFC's confirm plans to expand Anfield — a spade in the ground! http://t.co/DwqTlbfWLR pic.twitter.com/G9jOXxUR9n

— This Is Anfield (@thisisanfield) December 4, 2014"

Of course, the irony of the situation is that, had the council supported plans to rebuild the Main Stand back in the '90s, former owner David Moores would never have needed to sell the club to Tom Hicks and George Gillett, and expansion would have happened long before now.

Alas, it hasn't, and a series of catastrophic errors has led Liverpool's matchday revenue and capacity to hold the club back. Finally, though, progress has been made.

The plans, despite the number of corporate hospitality seats, should also ensure that the "old Anfield" will remain as part of the expansion.

What no Liverpool supporter wanted was a soulless bowl-design new stadium (check out this image for what might have been—a replica of Arsenal's Emirates) which the club previously explored under the Moores and Rick Parry leadership.

Remaining at Anfield and expanding the Main Stand retains the stadium's character and history. Yes, much has and will have changed, but the intimacy and unique design will remain.

Small aspects such as keeping the famed Anfield tunnel, its steps (although the number will be reduced) and the iconic "This Is Anfield" sign, plus maintaining its place offset from the halfway line are what will keep Anfield as Anfield.

The new Main Stand will see the third tier used as general sale seats and the new stand almost doubling its current size. Also, the design of its roof will push the noise down towards the pitch and should lead to an increased atmosphere—despite the large hospitality section that will make up the middle tier.

Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images

It's externally too where the plans are most impressive, providing a superb solution to the current deteriorated area outside the stadium, adding open spaces, fan areas and, perhaps most importantly, an improved position for the Hillsborough memorial.

The current position of the memorial is close to the roadside and near to the away fans' entrance; neither are ideal for obvious reasons. The new position will be protected from the weather and be more private, peaceful and appropriate.

Retaining the Shankly Gates (although being repositioned) will ensure parts of Anfield remain the same and that the history of the club lives on in the redeveloped stadium.