The old Wembley. We're very Anglo-centric when it comes to football in this country, but the old Wembley was genuinely an international treasure. There's so many examples of players from all countries saying that they adored it when they played there, or wish they had if they hadn't. The new one is a world class modern stadium but so indistinct that it might as well have been built by an Arab chairman for a Russian club.
The old. Many many years of history and would love FA Cup Final day. Too many corporate types who piss off at halftime and stroll back 10 minutes into the second half. Shite atmosphere as well.
if they could of done one thing with the New Wembley I wish they'd of had the tunnel behind the goal. The best thing used to be when the players used to walk out of the tunnel and the two teams would soak up the atmosphere whilst walking to in front of the Royal Box
The best time I had at the old wembley I watched us beat Man Utd 3-1 in the league cup final in 94 brilliant day top atmosphere.
OLD. I don't think I'll ever go to the new one for an England game, I would have gone to the Old one for an England game.
When Wembley was still terraced, the old was far better. Towards the end it was a pretty ropey stadium, with seats jammed in far closer than anywhere else in the country. The atmosphere was never the same once all-seated, even for play-off finals. There's corporate nonsense, and the awful "soccertainment" style PA guy at the new place, but it is a much better place to watch football. The old one was far more evocative from the outside though - the sort of place that could get the pulse racing by sight. The new one, arch apart, just looks like a conference centre.
Old. Will never forget my first visit as a kid, being on a coachload of hyper 8 year olds, then someone shouted "Look, the Towers" and the coach fell silent. New Wembley is alright but the Towers ruled.
The new stadium is less than 4 years old while the old was around for 70 plus years. So so many greats played at the old with many classic games including the '66 W/C Final, internationals and F.A. Cup Finals. Maybe in 20 or 30 years time the new ground will have collected enough memories to be compared to the old. One thing i did love about old Wembley was when the players would enter the pitch from behind the goal from the tunnel. Most grounds have players coming onto the pitch on the halfway line so was slightly different.
Not been to the new Wembley so can't judge as going there, but the new Wembley just looks awful IMO, typical soul-less modern-day football ground. Visited the old Wembley about 8 times, although the place was a dump, it was a cracking stadium for atmosphere, etc.
As with all old/new stadium debates, the new one is more comfortable and offers far better views and facilities, the old one is genuinely preferred for memories, sentimentality, and the more old fashioned football supporter rather than the 'customer'.
Cant believe you even started this thread! Its bloody obvious to anyone with one eye which stadium is better, these new bowls will ever be better than the old tradtional stadia we all sadly miss.
The new Wembley is a well-designed stadium, a poorly-designed football ground. There's no excuse for that many executive facilities - Arsenal have a good number less executive boxes and club deck seats yet still make a large revenue. But even with the executive facilities you could still make a good ground if you put them all in one stand. Have two small tiers of club decks in one stand, if you can't stick the executive boxes in that stand then have one or two levels of executive boxes in the opposite stand. The end result is a smaller gap between the lower and upper tiers in 3 of the stands and the fans can hear each other. Also the ends are free from executive rubbish. You could probably even make the lower tiers bigger, or made them single tiered stands. The lack of atmosphere, terracing, astronomic prices, huge cost of the stadium meaning so many events are held there that the specialness of going there is less. The increase in capacity has made travelling to and from the stadium worse and the view from the upper tier is poor. Now if I go to Wembley I have to get lower tier seats, a bit like the old wembley when you really need to get seats in the side stand. I've been to all the NFL games as well as Gillingham. With Gillingham I wanted tickets behind the goal so asked for tickets in that price band yet ended up with side stand upper tier tickets - row 15 at that! You can't compare those two seats.
I agree with that. It seems as if every man and their dog has been, even those that aren't football fans!
