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Stadium name


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Now that I'm getting comfortable with the idea of Saints being back in the Premiership a thought crossed my mind when looking around the various places we'll be visiting next season. Rather a lot seemed to be named after dodgy middle eastern dictatorships or employers of slave labour masquerading as sportswear manufacturers and it got me wondering whether Saints might be seeing similar characters arriving on the doorstep waving wads of cash under the nose.

 

Personally, I find the idea of offering naming rights rather distasteful and the idea of hearing Jeff Stelling telling his viewers that we're now going over to the Utterly Butterly Stadium to see how many Saints are leading Etihad City by fills me with despair. So I was just wondering what others might think of the idea should it ever come to pass. I reckon I'd just continue to call it St Mary's anyway.

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If I remember rightly, the stadium was to be named the Friend's Provident Stadium, to which 'St Mary's' got added due to fan pressure so that officially it was the FPSMS but it simply became called the SMS from day one and in due course, FP left the scene anyway. It seems an obvious problem in adopting company names that as sponsors go, so new names have to come. I can't keep up these days with what the Grand National is called, and the Premier League is just that to most people without the name of the world's worst bank being added.

I hope they don't sell the name as it cheapens the club. I wonder if the owners of the stadium names at Man City and Arsenal realise that those names do nothing to add to the pride of supporters in the way that Anfield does for Liverpool and I suspect most Newcastle fans are still going to St James' Park as far as they are concerned.

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I'm generally against, but look at it this way: it could be worth a new £7m player each season (Newcastle touting their stadium name rights about for £10m I believe). Also a sponsor name only ever becomes the most commonly used name for a stadium if the sponsors buy rights to a newly built stadium.

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I would be disappointed if we sold the so called naming rights but even if we did it would still be St Marys to every one which would devalue that sale anyway. If the Leibherr family after many more years either extend significantly the stadium or build another I doubt many would mind a formal change of name to say the Leibherr Arena.

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I would be disappointed if we sold the so called naming rights but even if we did it would still be St Marys to every one which would devalue that sale anyway. If the Leibherr family after many more years either extend significantly the stadium or build another I doubt many would mind a formal change of name to say the Leibherr Arena.

 

It would, but it wouldn't devalue the sale. As said above, Newcastle received around £10million for their naming rights - but everyone just calls it St James anyway.

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It would, but it wouldn't devalue the sale. As said above, Newcastle received around £10million for their naming rights - but everyone just calls it St James anyway.

 

Newcastle's situation is not a "proper" sale though, as Mike Ashley owns Sports Direct who have paid for the rights. Its yet to be seen whether any external organisation will fill the void when Sports Direct leave, and certainly at the level of price being suggested. Because of the history of St James Park, changing the stadium name could even potentially have a negative effect for the sponsor. Its akin to why Rangers & Celtic always have the same shirt sponsors, to avoid alienating an entire tranch of potential customers.

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I'm not totally against the idea if it brings in revenue that is needed by the club to stay in the black, i just hope its not a stupid sponser. Red bull stadium ok, tampax stadium no chance. Man city ground is the ethiad stadium which sounds ok but it means united in Arabic. I bet most city fans didn't know that when they become sponsors ha ha.

Ideally it'll just remain SMS.

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I agree, but not the analsol stadium please.

 

It will remain St Mary's as far as I'm concerned.

 

But of course it should have been named The Rupertdome in 2001.

 

Linking the above posts the answer is obvious:

 

The Anasol Rupert Stadium.

 

Has a certain 'ring' to it, don't you think ?

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Eerily I had this very thought today. If I had been a Newcastle fan, I'd have been thoroughly annoyed to have my stadium named differently to its traditional name. I can understand it being done to new stadiums, because you tend to get used to it, a la the Reebok, but I was always glad when Saints fans won their right to have the Friends Provident stadium renamed.

 

If it's good for revenue, I genuinely think it'd be ok, but it would have to be a decent advertiser, like 'Saints transport' or something! (The Saints stadium - perfect.)

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