Debasis Sen, London: With no Champions Trophy matches scheduled at the venue, Friday offered the best chance for all the visiting Indian media to pay a visit to the Lords cricket ground. The iconic venue has revealed its expansion plans on Friday along with the Oval.
Both the venues will get a facelift and the capacity will be increased as well. The capacity of the North West London stadium will be increased to 33000 while the South London stadium will have close to 40000 capacities before the start of the 2023 Ashes.
The MCC is considering two proposals. One would involve building two 10-storey blocks of flats adjacent to the Nursery Ground that would provide some £100 million towards ground development.
The other, less ambitious scheme, known as the Master-plan, would see work worth £89 million carried out using the club´s own funds.
MCC in a statement said that Lords will continue to stage matches while any building work was ongoing.
“MCC is assuming that it will continue to host its current level of international cricket because of its historically strong ticket sales and confidence that every touring team wants to play at Lord´s,” read the statement.
MCC members have been invited to give their views before a vote at a special general meeting in September.
The home of the reigning English County Champions has hosted over 200 matches and is celebrating the bicentenary this year. The famous Grace Gate, Bi-Centenary Gate, the Mound Stand, the East Gate proudly announce them as landmarks at this historic venue. The famous Mound Stand was later renamed after Sunil Gavaskar, Sir Gary Sobers and Aravinda de Silva.
The iconic members pavilion and the balcony has witnessed several historic feats, including that infamous shirt waving of Sourav Ganguly after winning the Champions Trophy. The state of the art JP Morgan media centre stands tall.
A visit to Lord’s is never complete if one doesn’t visit the indoor academy of the MCC. The academy has a “Wall of Fame” with rare pictures of Ranjit Singhji’s leg glance, WG Grace’s upright stance or Michael Holding’s gazelle like bowling action. Lastly, one can never miss out the museum which is by far the best in any cricket stadiums around the world.