Lucrative Liverpool: Anfield Stadium Re-Developed or Stanley Park Naming Rights?

Liverpool Football Club Managing Director Ian Ayre recently confirmed that the senior club hierarchy have held productive and informative talks with "several" global brands with a view to possibly selling the naming rights for the new stadium in Stanley Park, should the decision be taken to move away from current stadium Anfield.

Ayre was at pains to clarify that, as yet, no firm choice has been made on whether to stick or twist with regards to an expanded stadium, although he also admitted that talks relating to the naming rights—significantly, how much prospective sponsors would be willing to shell out—would go some way to determining the outcome of the decision.

So which would be the best way to go for Liverpool?

The stadium debate has dragged on for years now; the infamous “spade in the ground at 60 days” quote has gone way past being a bad joke, but even before the Texan cowboys rode into town back in 2007 a new stadium was something which had been on the agenda for the club for quite some time.

Fans were split then and some remain so; the heritage, history and tradition of Anfield or the custom-designed, sponsor-funded shiny new stadium across the way in Stanley Park?

First of all, let's get the raw numbers out the way. Why do Liverpool need a new stadium? Simply put, Liverpool are falling further behind their competitors such as Arsenal and Manchester United with every home game that passes.

In the most simple and roughest of terms, during a domestic season Anfield, which holds around 45.000 spectators at a time, hosts 19 league matches and perhaps two or three cup games, depending of course on the draw and how far Liverpool progress. Given that this season just finished Liverpool played one away FA Cup match and one home League Cup match only (which saw an attendance of just 22,.500), we will discount cup matches for these basic figures.

Nineteen home matches, multiplied by an average ticket price of £45 (they ranged from £39 to £48 for 2010/11), multiplied again by an average attendance of 43,000 gives a total ticket income of £36,765,000 per Premier League season, approximately £1.9 m per home match.

Compare this to Arsenal (19 x average ticket price of £60 x average attendance of 60.000) who rake in £68,400,000 per season (£3.6m per home game) and Manchester United (19 x £45 x 75,000) who collect £64,125,000 per season (£3.4 million per home game) and it is clear to see that the Reds have a severe handicap when it comes to spending power—and this is on ticket sales alone.

Next season Liverpool will not have any Europa League income to be grateful for either (four home games x £35 tickets x 38,000 average attendance = another £5.3 million) while both those clubs will contend Champions League football again next season. Newcastle United and Manchester City also had higher average attendances for the 2010/11 season than Liverpool.

Of course, the numbers are extremely rough—kids’ tickets, disabled seats, away supporters and season ticket price differences are not accounted for in the sums, but even taking that into account, 15,000 or 30,000 more people visiting the club shop, buying half time drinks and pies, doing first scorer scratch cards and making bets and buying match-day programmes all makes a hell of a lot of difference to the overall income of the club.

Should Anfield be increased to 60,000 capacity then over the course of a Premier League season the Reds would have their kitty boosted by up to an extra £14.5 million per season—nothing to sniffed at, especially in the climate of UEFA Financial Fair Play Regulations and ever-increasing player values.

Liverpool have been at pains to improve the so-called Anfield Experience recently under the stewardship of Ian Ayre—the Boot Room cafe and improved product range in the club shop are just two examples of that.

Few Reds would turn down the chance to stay at Anfield if it was a viable option, and if the planning permission can be sought and the physical improvements can be done with little fuss then it could be a great option for the club.

But this is a decision for the next hundred years of Liverpool’s existence; an extra £15 million a year is not the only thing to be kept in mind.

Football stadia worldwide are now used for so many other features: music concerts, community occasions and International matches are just a few of them.

Is Anfield capable of hosting those events? Are these other sources of income something that LFC want to look at and rely on? Are the surrounding areas beside Anfield Road and Walton Breck Road—neither exactly Sightseeing Avenue—able to cope with the added demand of between 10,000 and 20,000 extra pairs of shoes every other week, or indeed more frequently at times? There is no parking in or beside the stadium itself; visitors arrive at the ground on foot having departed buses, trains or cars elsewhere.

The original plans for Anfield, after the building of Stanley Park Stadium, as it was, would have been to regenerate it into Anfield Plaza, with offices, restaurants and the like introduced to renovate the area.

All great, but all more expensive of course.

The Stanley Park Stadium was due to cost around £300 million to complete; doubtless the price will have by now increased somewhat as a result of inflation if nothing else, despite the recent economic downturn.

Arsenal’s Emirates Stadium earned the club £100 million for a 15-year deal on naming rights—however, this included an eight-year shirt sponsorship. Given that Liverpool have a four-year deal for shirt sponsorship with Standard Chartered worth £20 million per year, it seems that either Ayre and his commercial team have pulled a magnificent rabbit out of a hat by getting so much from the Asia-based bank, or else that Arsenal were short-changed for their double sponsorship income allowance.

In either case, I would certainly expect a payment of at least £5 million per year for naming rights for any new Liverpool FC stadium—and in truth I would hope it to be quite considerably more than that, perhaps around double.

A ten year deal to net the club £100 million for the stadium would go quite some way towards off-setting the construction costs, perhaps as much as a quarter or a third of the total cost—and therefore is absolutely the way to go if a new stadium is the answer.

Of course, nobody wants to be playing at the Tampax Stadium, the Mr. Muscle Bowl or the McDonald’s Arena—but in all honesty, the few corporations who are global enough to want to work with a major football side and profitable enough to pay such high levies for the privilege of having their name adorn the club’s home ground shouldn’t have any real issues with wacky name tags.

Hopefully some time during what is doubtless going to be a hugely busy summer for the Reds—the tour of Asia and the impending signing of Jordan Henderson are two such examples—there will be further news on the final decision to be taken by the Reds.

I can say with no hesitation that I have been impressed enough by Ian Ayre’s leadership and revenue generation so far—even under the despicable duo—that I am confident he and his team will make absolutely the right decision for the long term of the club.

Just don’t promise us anything spade-related.

You can follow me on Twitter @karlmatchett and on EighteenAndFive.