It’s time to put emotions to one side and admit that Scottish football needs a new home.
There’s a reason why, in a recent survey of Scottish Football fans, only 15 per cent wanted to stay at Hampden: it’s an awful football stadium.
Yes, there are still those who cling to Hampden’s history, arguing that if the SFA were to turn their back on Hampden, they’d be turning their back on over 100 years of history.
But when St Johnstone won their first ever Scottish Cup in 2014, or when over 40,000 Aberdeen fans showed up to see their team win the League Cup that same year, do you think anybody in the stands cared that the finals were played at Celtic Park and not Hampden?
Of course not.
Ultimately, fans making their way to Hampden don’t care about the stadiums tradition. What they do care about – beyond seeing their team win, of course – is an enjoyable experience; a reason to get out and spend their money going to the game when they could just sit at home and watch it from the comfort of their own couch.
Unfortunately, Hampden just doesn’t deliver.
As a place to go and watch the biggest matches in the country, it’s an awful experience for the fans.
For those unfortunate to be stuck behind either goal, good luck being able to tell what’s going on at the far end of the pitch – the slope that Hampden was developed on means you’ll find yourself so far away from the action you’ll wonder why you bothered showing up at all.
As for the atmosphere, sure, when Scotland are playing big games against the likes of England, Hampden gets loud – there’s 50,000 crazy Scottish fans packed in, how could it not be? But we’ve become far too used to seeing a half empty stadium on a cold midweek as Scotland play out yet another uninspiring draw against uninspiring opposition.
On evenings like these, Hampden becomes a soulless and borderline depressing place to be, as any attempt to produce noise gets swallowed up by the Glasgow night before it makes it halfway across the pitch.
And then, just to add insult to injury, the nearest train station, Mount Florida, is tiny and ill-equipped to deal with tens of thousands of fans travelling to and from the stadium, meaning you can find yourself queueing for upwards of half an hour just to get back into the centre of Glasgow.
Good luck getting home on a Wednesday night if you’re from up north.
That’s why it’s time that the SFA put the fans first and say goodbye to Hampden when the current lease on the stadium expires in 2020.
One of the most popular alternatives amongst fans would be moving to Murrayfield.
On the face of it, that would solve a lot of the issues.
Murrayfield is a ten-minute walk from Haymarket station, and not much further from the centre of Edinburgh, whilst it’s widely regarded as being a better stadium for fans, both in terms of being able to see the action on the pitch and generating atmosphere.
But moving away from Hampden is the perfect chance for the SFA to spread their wings and take Scotland matches (and the biggest cup matches) on the road.
It’s an opportunity to give people who wouldn’t usually get to go to Scotland matches the chance, whilst filling stadiums like Pittodrie, Easter Road and Tynecastle would immediately improve the atmosphere of smaller games – you only have to look at last months friendly with the Netherlands at Pittodrie to see how interest can increase by getting away from the Hampden humdrum.
And for the bigger games – the cup finals and crucial internationals – we can use the bigger stadiums like Ibrox, Celtic Park and Murrayfield.
It’s the best of both worlds.
Of course, there are logistical issues that come without having a settled home, but the fans won’t care about that if they’re enjoying the football.
But whatever the SFA decide to do, it’s time to say goodbye to Hampden.
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