SACA vote today

SA footy may go to the Adelaide Oval...and the vote is on today...personally I support the move...the ground would get an upgrade and the hopeless autobahn of a pitch will be dug up

from abconline


The South Australian Government is not saying what it will do if a vote tonight rejects upgrade plans for Adelaide Oval, but Premier Mike Rann thinks a substantial majority will vote 'yes'.
There has been heated debate for months over the plan to upgrade the famous cricket stadium and put AFL matches there.
SA Cricket Association CEO John Harnden has made a last-ditch appeal to SACA members.
"This is a game changer for the sport of cricket for the whole of the state and really gives us the opportunity to put ourselves on an equal footing to our counterparts in the eastern states," he said.
No-vote campaigner Greg Howe hopes the 75 per cent yes vote will not be achieved.
"Football is the absolute massive beneficiary of this proposal and as presently advised the football interests are not contributing $1 to this entire project," he said.
Adelaide City Councillor Anne Moran doubts it would be money well spent.
"Privately I'm a 'no' voter. I think half a billion dollars deserves a referendum. I think it's an enormous waste of money," she said.
There are about 19,500 Cricket Association members with voting rights, but the process is not compulsory.
The Premier is coy about what rejection of the plan would mean.
"I hope that commonsense will prevail. I hope that people will vote for cricket, I hope that they vote for Adelaide," he said on the eve of the ballot.
Mr Harnden has dismissed suggestions 60 per cent of proxy votes already counted supported the redevelopment plan.
"I'm not sure where those numbers have come from," he said.
"Those votes go straight to Computershare and those votes are being independently handled, managed and counted by those people."
SACA members will gather at the Adelaide Showgrounds on Monday evening.
Counting is likely to take some hours.

horace wrote:SA footy may go to the Adelaide Oval...and the vote is on today...personally I support the move...the ground would get an upgrade and the hopeless autobahn of a pitch will be dug up

Agree wholeheartedly with this, h. The problem is, drop in pitches tend to be roads as well.

neither the gabba or the scg are roads and they are both drop in...plus the G has improved too

the Addy Oval ground staff are the most over rated in Oz

I think it will be a travesty if the Adelaide Oval is used for AFL and becomes a 50,000 seat concrete jungle. The last Australian Cricket Ground with character will have then been destroyed.

A purist view and a fair one, Trev, but the patrons probably got sick of sitting on wooden planks.

Last time I saw it they weren't sitting on wooden planks. The facilities there look very good and the new stand is excellent. It already seats 25,000 now which is more than any English ground apart from Lord's. It still feels like a cricket ground, designed purely for cricket. It will be unfortunate if that changes.

We all know Sozzies are farquits ...so whatever they decide it will create an abortion of a ground

So does the Adeliade Hwy become "The Afterbirth"?

The Placenta of Excellence

Hehehe, sharp as.

horace wrote:neither the gabba or the scg are roads and they are both drop in...

Really? The cricket pitch area at the Gabba has been the source of controversy this year in the AFL.

And the centre of the SCG looked very muddy on Friday night due to the cricket pitch area.

really...whole of scg was a quagmire...oh well I might be wrong

Yeah, sorry, h , I think you've got it wrong there. No way the SCG is a drop in and I don't think the Gabba is either.

and I am...debate raging in chip central over whether they shd get a drop-in

skully wrote:Yeah, sorry, h , I think you've got it wrong there. No way the SCG is a drop in and I don't think the Gabba is either.

And surprise surprise, they're the two best Test pitches in Australia.

Aye, Trev. A massage from the Swedish Prime Minister.

The Gabba has good drainage so unless it is actually pissing down while they are playing or they pay homage to Moorabbin like they did last week then the surface is dry and the pitch area doesnt get turned into a mud heap ...(Anyone know if the Lions train on the ground?)

It also usually only has one game per fortnight on it (two until the GCS start playing at Carrara)

The G was having up to 3 games per week on it ...plus teams having training on it which was destroying the grass in the pitch area

Didn't the SCG have a new drainage system installed last Winter? It's never been a ground thats held up well to the Football codes. Always seems to get muddy and uneven very quickly.

The SCG was completely returfed in recent times. The Google Maps Satellite view photos were (still might be, CBF checking) of the SCG with almost no grass on it. I believe it was a major job including drainage being redone.

Of course, Sydney getting a heap of rain lately wouldn't help, but from watching the match on Friday night, it was amazing how quickly the ground conditions improved when the rain stopped.

What happened with the vote. No doubt the Sozzies will betray the great game.

From ABC

Adelaide Oval revamp to go ahead

Posted 2 hours 10 minutes ago


A proposed $535 million redevelopment of Adelaide Oval will proceed after South Australian Cricket Association members voted to share the ground with the AFL.

AFL matches will return to the historic inner city oval when it becomes a multi-purpose stadium from 2014.

SACA members on Monday night effectively ratified the plan at a special general meeting.

Some 80 per cent of more than 12,000 members voted to change their constitution to allow control of the ground to be split between cricket and AFL.

The Rann Labor government pledged $535 million for the project, a centrepiece of a successful re-election campaign last year.

Under the proposal, the SACA's $85 million debt is cleared and AFL clubs, Adelaide and Port Adelaide, will play matches at the redeveloped oval.

The stadium will host about 50,000 spectators, an increase from the current 37,000 capacity.

The state government promised $450 million for the project in a 2010 pre-election pledge, but the latest cost estimate is $535m.

Qunts. Sozzies shouldn't be allowed to vote. What a waste of money.

so what happens with Football Park? Bulldozing?

excellent result for cricket and the AFL

Do they mention whether it will have drop-ins?