Former PM Tony Blair was keen on Wimbledon FC relocating to Belfast

[Nearly Sane]

Well they were the Crazy Gang!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/67832071

[Steve H]

What an outrageous idea - as was what eventually happened, a move to Milton Keynes. Both ideas showed disregard for the fans, who obviously would not be able to visit the ground regularly, assuming they lived in or near Wimbledon (which many probably didn't, but it's still messing them around for the sake of politics). I know that there was much anger from the fans at the time. (Not that I give a toss about football, but I can understand how they felt.)
If AFC Wimbledon, the replacement club, have a stadium near the site of the old one, why couldn't Wimbledon FC have been given a new stadium there?

[jeremyp]

We've had Welcome to Wrexham. The programme about this one should have been called Bollocks to Belfast.

[jeremyp]

What an outrageous idea - as was what eventually happened, a move to Milton Keynes. Both ideas showed disregard for the fans, who obviously would not be able to visit the ground regularly, assuming they lived in or near Wimbledon (which many probably didn't, but it's still messing them around for the sake of politics). I know that there was much anger from the fans at the time. (Not that I give a toss about football, but I can understand how they felt.)
If AFC Wimbledon, the replacement club, have a stadium near the site of the old one, why couldn't Wimbledon FC have been given a new stadium there?

AFC Wimbledon's ground is much smaller than Wimbledon FC's ground was. Furthermore, the fact that Wimbledon AFC were able to build a new stadium in 2017 does not imply that the same would have been possible for Wimbledon FC fifteen years earlier.

[Nearly Sane]

While moves of football teams in the UK are rare, they are not the same as one being moved with support from the govt for political reasons, that seem almost certain to make things worse. It seems to show Blair understood neither football nor Northern Ireland.

[jeremyp]

While moves of football teams in the UK are rare, they are not the same as one being moved with support from the govt for political reasons, that seem almost certain to make things worse. It seems to show Blair understood neither football nor Northern Ireland.

It doesn't seem to me that this is anything more than a bit of brainstorming.