FRUSTRATED by a string of broken promises, the Football Association is to announce this morning that none of its scheduled showcase matches will be played at Wembley Stadium this year.

Today was the day when a gleaming, finished arena was due to be handed over to the FA, but instead the building site is a shambles blighted by safety fears, issues with sub- contractors and concerns over further cost overruns.

Regardless of whether Multiplex, the lead contractor on the £757 million project, can finish work on the 90,000-seat stadium by mid-summer, as the company was expected to tell the Australian Stock Exchange in the early hours of this morning, officials at Soho Square have decided to avoid constant uncertainty over four important fixtures and a clutch of high-profile music events by moving them to alternative venues. The earliest an England match will be played on the increasingly costly turf will be February 2007.

The move is indicative of the growing level of distrust within the FA of the company it tasked to build the world’s most expensive stadium. Multiplex has missed three completion deadlines since taking on the project and is expected to make a £200 million loss. A cap of £14 million on late penalties means that the builders are not motivated to work faster now that the project is well behind schedule.

The FA had hoped to open Wembley with the Community Shield on August 13, followed by an England friendly on August 16, having seen all chances of staging the FA Cup Final there on May 13 ebb away earlier this year as the construction timetable slipped. However, a pragmatic approach over planning has been adopted after Multiplex indicated a “full practical completion” date would not be forthcoming until September.

Wembley National Stadium Ltd (WNSL) , the FA subsidiary that owns the stadium, needs a further two months to fit out the venue and stage test events in order to get a safety certificate from Brent Council.

That timetable put in doubt the opening two European Championship qualifying matches, against Andorra on September 2 and Macedonia on October 7. The FA is expected to announce in the next week where those fixtures will be played. The first England game at Wembley could take place on international fixture dates in February or March.

The FA’s decision means that the Rugby Football League will also have to look for an alternative venue for this year’s Powergen Challenge Cup final as its staging contract is with WNSL. The RFL has already sold more than 30,000 tickets for the final, which will be held on the Saturday of the August Bank Holiday weekend. It could relocate the match to Twickenham, which is free on that date.

It is not just sport that will be disrupted. Four big stadium performers were scheduled to play Wembley this summer. Bon Jovi and Take That will relocate to the Milton Keynes Bowl. The Rolling Stones are expected to return to Twickenham, while Robbie Williams has yet to announce where he will now play.

Wembley was originally scheduled for completion last autumn but delays were caused by the complex nature of the steel roof and poor industrial relations on site.

Fresh problems — most spectacularly the collapse of a roof beam — arose in recent weeks, causing construction progress to slow to a near halt. There was also another sub-contractors’ pay dispute that led to 120 steelworkers, scaffolders and welders being handed their P45s.

If Multiplex does manage to finish Wembley by the summer, there is the prospect of a completed stadium lying dormant for several months. This would move an already sorry story into the realms of farce. The FA needs to be earning money from its biggest asset as soon as possible after borrowing £433 million from a consortium of banks. A capital and interest repayment of £40 million is due in September and was to be funded out of the stadium’s cashflow.

NO-SHOWS

Events already moved or expected to be switched to alternative venues because of the delay

RUGBY LEAGUE
Aug 28: Challenge Cup Final

CONCERTS
June 10, 11: Bon Jovi
June 24, 25: Take That
Aug 20, 22: Rolling Stones
Sept 14-16, 18, 19: Robbie Williams