Life after AFL for good old Subi

Good old Subiaco Oval, she has served WA football so well.

But, in what is well known to every AFL fan still picking splinters from their backside after surviving substandard seating at the venue marketers now want us to call Patersons Stadium, there isn't much life left in the old girl.

On a whim Premier Colin Barnett deemed Perth's new super multi-purpose venue - the next home of AFL football in the State - would be built at Burswood. It is easier to have a collect from Lotto than determining when the first ball will be kicked in Col's Bowl.

Yet, it is more likely that sooner rather than later Subiaco Oval will be retired.

So what do you do with an old sports ground with room for 43,000 people?

There isn't a Sunday market that has a grandstand stall. And unlike overseas sports that frequently explode old stadiums as they move to bigger, more modern, digs, Australia doesn't have a lot of experience with recycling redundant sports grounds.

The major stadia in Australia's big cities have been around for more than a century - MCG, SCG, Adelaide Oval, Gabba, even our WACA Ground. They have undergone significant renovations but are mostly on the site they have occupied since the turf was first tossed to develop the venues.

The AFL's quickly-forgotten ground in Waverley is one example of a major coliseum put on the sporting scrapheap. Just 20 years ago VFL/AFL Park hosted a grand final. Today it features a new housing estate, although the playing ground and the main grandstand still exist as the training base for Hawthorn.

Neither the WA Football Commission nor the City of Subiaco has yet discussed what to do with the Subiaco Oval corpse once its lifeblood has disappeared.
Obviously many of the stands will have to be torn down.

But the WAFC hopes Subiaco Oval can remain a football facility of some kind.

Several commissioners favour the ground being reduced to a 15,000 boutique stadium that could remain a training base for West Coast and also be the much-needed home of WA umpiring, WAFL games, including finals, and under-18s squad training.

There is also some consideration that in such a high-density suburb, the stadium could be completely stripped to become an open greenfield site for residents.

Subiaco Oval generates a mammoth economic benefit to the area. There will be a push for the footprint to continue to provide commercial opportunities for surrounding businesses when the football spectators have gone.

What should happen to Subiaco Oval?

Well, at least we have plenty of time to come up with the best decision because although the ground's days as the premier stadium in town are numbered, there are plenty of calendars to tick off before that time comes.