No football club in 2012 stadium, says shops developer

THE owners of the Stratford City shopping centre next to the Olympic Park are opposed to the main stadium becoming home to a Premier League football team, according to sources.

They have said that Westfield, the developer of the £1.4billion retail complex, considers a top-flight team moving in after the Games would be bad for business.

Stratford City is adjacent to the Olympic Park and up to 60,000 fans would pass through the shopping centre en route to the stadium from Stratford Regional station.

The prospect of the main stadium being home to a football club as part of the Games legacy was raised again last month when Jacques Rogge, president of the International Olympic Committee, said an athletics track could make way for a dedicated football stadium to stop the site becoming a white elephant.

West Ham had a bid for the stadium rejected two years ago but remain the most likely club to become a tenant. Mr Rogge is in London today to give a lecture at the beginning of a week-long debriefing from the organisers of the Beijing Games.

Stratford City will be home to flagship stores from John Lewis, Waitrose and Marks&Spencer and these leading retailers are thought to oppose having football as a neighbour. A Westfield spokesman said: "Our understanding is that the ODA [Olympic Delivery Authority] is reducing the stadium to 25,000 and they have not much encouraged it [a Premier League football club].

"I don't think we have made a public view on it although we are keen observers. I am sure it is something our planners would want to have a look at." The ODA is building an 80,000-capacity stadium that will shrink to a mixed use 25,000-seat venue after the Games.

Olympics chiefs are committed to an athletics track and have been in talks with rugby clubs and championship football team Leyton Orient about moving in after the Games.