Selhurst Park - History

History

In 1922 the site, a former brickfield, was bought from the Brighton Railway Company for £2,570. The stadium (designed by Scottish stadium architect Archibald Leitch) was constructed by Humphreys of Kensington (a firm regularly used by Leitch) for around £30,000, and was officially opened by the Lord Mayor of London on 30 August 1924. There was then only one stand (the present Main Stand), but this was unfinished due to industrial action; Crystal Palace played Sheffield Wednesday and lost 0–1 in front of 25,000 fans.

Two years later, in 1926, England played Wales in an international at the stadium. England amateur matches and various other finals were also staged there, as were other sports including boxing, bicycle polo (in the late 1940s) and cricket and music concerts (in the 1980s). In addition to this, it hosted two games for the 1948 Summer Olympics.

In 1953, the stadium's first floodlights were installed consisting of numerous poles around the 3 sides of terracing and four roof mounted installations on the Main Stand, but were replaced nine years later by floodlights mounted on four pylons in each corner and six installations on the Main Stand roof. Real Madrid marked the occasion by playing the first game under the new set of bulbs – a real footballing coup at the time for third division Palace, as it was Real's first ever match in London.

The ground remained undeveloped until 1969 when Palace were promoted to Division One (then the 1st tier of English football) for the first time. The Arthur Wait Stand was built, and is named after the club's long-serving chairman, who was a builder by trade and was often seen working on the site himself. Arthur Wait was notable for overseeing Palace's rise from the 4th to the 1st Division in the 1960s. The Whitehorse Lane end had a new look with a "second tier" of terracing and brick-built refreshments and toilets along the top.

Due to the Safety of Grounds Act, the Holmesdale Road terrace the preferred stand for the Crystal Palace supporters (or the Kop as it was known) had to be split into three sections for safety reasons. The remaining poorer facilities were mainly where the opposition supporters were situated. New facilities were subsequently built at the back of the Holmesdale Stand. In the Summer of 1981, the Main Stand terraced enclosure was reprofiled and replaced by seating.

In 1981, Palace sold the back of the Whitehorse Lane terrace and land behind to supermarket retailer Sainsbury's for £2m, to help their financial problems and the size of the terrace at this end was effectively halved when this end reopened.

Charlton Athletic moved in as temporary tenants in 1985, and became with Palace the first league clubs in England to agree such a ground-sharing scheme. The following year, chairman Ron Noades purchased the stadium from the club as a means of raising revenue. In the Summer of 1990, the lower half of the Arthur Wait Stand was converted into all-seater with the assistance of Football Trust Grant Aid, due to the Taylor Report following the Hillsborough Disaster. Two rows of executive boxes (48 in total) were constructed above the Whitehorse Lane terrace on the roof of Sainsbury's supermarket in 1991 and it was roofed and made all-seater in the summer of 1993.

Charlton moved back to The Valley via West Ham's Boleyn Ground, and Wimbledon F.C. replaced them as tenants in 1991. The Holmesdale terrace was demolished in 1994 and replaced a year later with a two-tiered 8,500 capacity stand. The roof cladding of the main stand was also replaced, the previous one having started to leak. Some 15 years on, this remains the most recent major work to be carried out at Selhurst Park.

When Mark Goldberg bought Crystal Palace, he bought just the club and former Palace chairman Ron Noades retained Selhurst Park, having purchased it from the club in 1986. Chairman Simon Jordan took out a ten year lease on the ground upon his purchase of the club in 2000 and Noades received rent from Palace. Wimbledon relocated to Milton Keynes in 2003, a section of their fans already having decamped to the newly established AFC Wimbledon in protest when the old club were given permission by the FA to move in 2002.

Palace chairman Jordan stated he had completed a purchase of the freehold of Selhurst Park from Altonwood Limited (Ron Noades' company) for £12m in October 2006. However ownership was in fact held by Selhurst Park Limited, owned by a joint venture between HBOS and the Rock property empire owned by Paul Kemsley, a former director of Tottenham Hotspur. In April 2008 a 25 year lease was granted to Crystal Palace at an annual rent of £1.2m. When the Rock group went into administration in June 2009, the management of the freehold was taken on by PwC acting on behalf of Lloyds Bank which now own HBOS. PwC expected to sell it within two years. Simon Jordan never owned the freehold or had any interest in it and his reasons for claiming he had bought it are unknown. The property company exited administration when purchased by the CPFC 2010 consortium in June 2010, leading to the stadium and Football Club being united in a company for the first time since 1998.

Following from this, January 2011 saw CPFC 2010 announce plans to redevelop the Crystal Palace National Sports Centre, the club's original home, in five years' time. However, opposition from Crystal Palace residents and Bromley council have seen the plans become increasingly unfeasable, resulting in suggestions that Selhurst Park should be redeveloped gradually similar to Molineux stadium (home to Wolves).

On 1 June 2012 it was revealed that Crystal Palace co-chairman Steve Parish had approached Rugby Union team London Welsh about a possible ground-share, as their plans to play their matches at Kassam Stadium were deemed unsuitable by the RFU, after securing promotion to the English Premiership. The RFU are threatening to deny London Welsh their rightful promotion unless they can come to a compromise.