THE SYDNEY Swans are looking into the possibility of moving their home base away from the SCG, conceding their facilities at the ground are "pretty tired and old".
The Swans have been based in Light Tower No.4 at the SCG for 12 years, during which time the business has grown enormously.
Chief executive Andrew Ireland says the club is outgrowing the facility and has spent the past six months analysing its next move, which could include outlaying $40 million on a new home base.
The options include a move to the nearby Centennial Parklands or to a redeveloped Entertainment Quarter, which adjoins the SCG.
Following a model adopted by some English premier league clubs, and AFL teams Essendon and Fremantle, and building a new facility some distance from its home ground are also alternatives.
"I think the main thing is our footy department really enjoys being based at the SCG, but on the other hand our facilities are probably becoming pretty tired and old, despite the fact we spent nearly one million dollars upgrading our change rooms last year," Ireland told the Swans' website.
"We’ve been in these offices for 12 years, and are approaching 13 seasons, and space is getting tight as the business has grown.
"We are, and have been for the last six months, considering what our facilities would look like going into the future.
"I think fundamentally there are a couple of different approaches and we’ve been talking to a number of different people about what we might do.
"We’re certainly speaking to the SCG, but if we stay at the SCG there will always be some confines as we’ve got a pretty tight environment around us, as well as a stadium that has to function operationally on match days.
"So whatever we’re able to do with our facilities at the SCG, I think will always be a little compromised, as they always have to fit into a pretty defined area.
"At the other end of the spectrum is what a lot of the overseas teams do and that is move their footy operations a long way from where they play.
"If you go to Manchester United, while they play at Old Trafford, their training facilities are actually 20 kilometres away from Manchester, out in the country where they’ve been able to get space and the like.
"Fremantle are doing something similar at the moment where they’ve got a $110 million project to move from Fremantle out into another location, but they get a bit more land and can build multiple ovals.
"We’re hopeful that in the next six months we can come up with a definitive plan about where we’re going to go."
Ireland has pointed to examples like the club's gym, which only has room to house about a third of the club's playing list at any one time.
The club has already spoken to architects about the logistics involved with building a new facility.
"If we’re talking about building a standalone facility, and we’ve been through this with architects and the like, is that we’re probably talking around a $40 million spend to build it," Ireland said.
"We’re not a wealthy club and we tend to spend as much money as we can on our footy programs and doing the other things we want to do well.
"We haven’t got any debt so we are reluctant to bite off a huge amount of debt because inevitably, if you’ve got a lot of debt and then your team starts to not perform as well, the first effect is that your football programs get cut.
"That’s something we don’t want to see happen.
"How we progress with getting the facilities to where we want without debt is probably the conundrum.
"It’s a big project and I would think in this next year there will be some exciting outcomes in terms of the stadiums and the facilities."
