From a distance, the new Wembley Stadium looks like a stately cruise liner forced by rough seas to dock in some tatty West African port. With its gleaming surfaces and huge vaulting arch, the stadium is all glamour, yet it is moored in a desolate landscape littered with kebab shops and second-hand car dealerships, with the muddy waters of Neasden and Dollis Hill lapping at its hull.
Even as you walk closer, appearance and reality keep clashing against one another. It looks magnificent. Yet across the dazzling expanses of metal and glass, there are also little yellow dots swarming like ants. In their hard hats and yellow jackets, the builders are still hammering away to get this beast finished. Deadlines come and go. The 2006 FA Cup Final? No. The coming football season? No. 2007? Maybe. Like a bride-to-be having second thoughts, Wembley doesn’t really want to commit to a date any more.
‘How’s it going?’ I ask Kevin, who is laying bricks for what one day will be the pathway leading from the Tube into the stadium. ‘Same as most sites,’ he replies.
‘Anyone got any idea when it might be finished?’
He shrugs. Anyone who’s ever employed a builder will recognise that shrug. With a flick of a tattooed shoulder, two messages are neatly conveyed. It’ll take longer than planned. And it’s going to cost you.
And indeed it will. Lord Foster’s design for the new Wembley is as eye-catching and impressive as most of his work. But the 90,000-seat stadium has already run wildly over schedule. It had a budget of £757 million, making it the most expensive sports stadium in the world. It is bogged down in delays and legal battles. The Australian company building it has been brought low.
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