Wright: Castleford stadium will still go ahead
Castleford Tigers chief executive Richard Wright still believes the cub can go ahead with plans for a new stadium.
The Tigers are now focusing on their own plans after the idea of a groundshare with Wakefield Trinity was ruled out by the Wildcats.
Yesterday the RFL confirmed that a Co-operative Championship side will be given an engage Super League franchise, and Castleford are among the favourites to lose their license.
“We agreed to the study on the possibility of sharing a stadium,” Wright told the Super League Show.
“That now will not happen, so for us it is now going full steam ahead for our own project at Glasshoughton.”
“Had the feasibility study on the ground share gone ahead we would certainly have considered the findings and would have consult with fans about it.
“It would have given us food for thought and we certainly had not ruled the idea out of moving to junction 30 if the study had given us every reason to do so.”
Instead Castleford will go it alone, as will Wakefield, with the Tigers planning a new stadium at Junction 32, a site that already includes a major shopping centre and other attractions.
“Our project at Junction 32 is ideal, as it already has a major leisure destination, with shopping, a ski slope and restaurants and there is plans for a surf world centre too.
“It has over 3,500,000 visitors a year there already and is a marketing man’s dream I imagine for a stadium to be put there.
“It’s a great location with great links and we’ve developed this project for the last five years. We are well on track with it and have an outline consent for it all. So there are many good things about it.
“We don’t know much about Wakefield’s junction 30 scheme.”
With the RFL confirming that Super League cannot expand beyond 14 clubs Castleford are one of the favourites to be excluded from the top flight, alongside Wakefield and Salford.
Much is likely to depend on which club is the most advanced with their stadium plans at the time of the license decision.