Exclusive – Brady: West Ham’s bid is best for London

Karren Brady has told talkSPORT the whole of London will benefit if West Ham win the right to move into the Olympic Stadium.

The Hammers are battling Tottenham to take over the Stratford venue after the 2012 games and Brady insists it will be best for everyone if her club gets the nod.

“The really important thing is that if West Ham get the Olympic Stadium there’s five generation projects going on in London and that’s why 12 London boroughs are supporting us,” said West Ham’s vice-chairman.

“You get the redevelopment of Green Street in the east end of London because we’re moving to the Olympic Stadium, the Olympic Stadium gets regenerated because it’s used 365 days a year across all disciplines.

“Then Tottenham gets redeveloped because if Spurs can’t move to the Olympic they're going to redevelop Haringey, Crystal Palace want to move out of Selhurst Park, which will get redeveloped, and into Crystal Palace, which also get redeveloped, so that’s five major projects across London.”

Spurs chairman Daniel Levy has hit out at West Ham’s plans to retain the stadium and the running track, claiming football and athletics cannot co-exist successfully there.

But Brady added: “What has been suggested is we’ll pick up our goalposts on a Friday afternoon, walk round to the Olympic Stadium and trot up and play a football match on Saturday.

“There’ll be a £95million conversion of that stadium which will turn it from what it is into what it should and could be, which is a truly multi-purpose stadium, fit for athletics, fit for football, fit for cricket and fit for major events.

“It will convert from a 25,000 small athletics meeting right the way up to a 107,00 Madonna concert and everything in between and actually when it has been finished there won’t be a single seat in that stadium that will have a worse view of the pitch than Wembley.

“In fact the seat furthest away at the Olympic Stadium is ten yards closer to the pitch than the seat furthest away at Wembley and that in itself means the atmosphere is created, the view is created, it will retain its iconic status and we do believe the disciplines can all sit together.”