Man Utd contract offer set to spark ‘fight scene like end of Anchorman’

The battle for the honour of designing ‘s new stadium or redeveloping Old Trafford has been tipped to emulate the iconic fight scene at the end of Anchorman. is looking to modernise United’s home, either by overseeing a rebuild of the Sir Bobby Charlton Stand or the construction of a new 100,000-seater arena behind the Stretford End.United are not expected to make any final decisions until next year, but there will be no shortage of interest from design firms in taking on the highest-profile sporting job in Britain since the new Wembley was built.

Dan Meis, an American architect who designed Everton’s new home at Bramley-Moore Dock, has joked that an upcoming meeting between experts at Old Trafford cricket ground will have the potential to descend into chaos.He told : “I don’t know if you’ve seen the fight scene between the rival news crews at the end of Anchorman, but it’s going to be like that.”Andy Shaffer, the head of the Old Trafford regeneration project, is also due to be at next week’s summit. It remains to be seen which direction the Red Devils will go in when it comes to revamping their home stadium, which is in dire need of modernisation.The report states that United bosses are leaning towards the idea of building an entirely new arena, as opposed to renovating Old Trafford. The potential new venue has been described as a ” to rival the national stadium in London.

A task force chaired by Lord Coe is expected to carry out a feasibility study in the new year before presenting the findings to United. They are said to be exploring both options within the broader regeneration project with a focus on ‘the art of the possible’.Meis believes the biggest challenge of constructing a new stadium will be to preserve United’s heritage, given that moving away from Old Trafford would pull at the heartstrings of match-going supporters.”We spoke to United a couple of years ago and did a kind of vision study, looking at the possibilities of a transformation of the existing building of Old Trafford,” he said.”We’re pretty familiar with the challenges of that and the challenges of the expanding site. One of the things that’s always a challenge, particularly I think in English football, is giving up that sort of history, of generations of going to that place.”In the US we’re turning over stadiums in 20, 30 years, which I think is a real shame. In the UK, it’s just not as easy.”