If it were me Id re apply for the kop rebuild and move it back 10 meters fill in the corners and alow in time bramall lane to move up 10 meters
This is a very sensible idea but the Club are not far sighted enough to adopt it.
It stems from the fact that the footprint is so tight at the BL end , but we have loads of unused space behind the Kop.
My view is that the most the Club will do ,
until we are actually in the Prem , is extend the back of the Kop and remove the pillars.
There are several reasons militating in favour of this.
We could do with another 3,000 home seats in the Championship and they will be on a steeper rake.
The building work can be cleverly managed so as not to reduce current capacity by very much - because we can't afford to lose ticket revenue or disappoint the extra supporters we have just gained.
The job will be relatively cheap , given we leave the mound in situ.
The increased "space" under the rearward extension can immediately generate significant revenue by making it possible for thousands more folk to spend their money on ale , pies & bovril in the lead-up to the game and at half-time - it is nothing short of a joke that so much potential revenue is lost because we can only serve about 2 dozen people at half-time when the Kop holds 10,000. So the ROI makes the accountants happy.
If BTL & I were doing it , we'd chop the first 10 rows of the bottom of the kop and move the pitch 10 yards towards Shoreham Street.
The benefit of this is long-term and justifies the loss of those seats - about 1,800 (less the number of seats currently behind posts).
The view from Bramall Lane Upper Tier & Westfield Corner is so good , it will barely be affected by the goal moving 10 yards forward.
The view from BL Lower Tier I couldn't give a fuck about , because away fans can go there for now.
Eventually , we will do something better with BLLT , for example make the stand one complete rake from back to front , and the 10 yard move will give us the room to do it.
OK , the seats in the BL end of SS & John Street will find themselves a bit "stranded" , but they are netted-off anyway , so no loss.
And shifting the pitch and front of the Kop backwards towards Shoreham Street will facilitate much better corner-infilling.
But I fear the Club will not take this far-sighted view and will leave the pitch where it is.
A pity , because should we ever make it to the Prem , any sensible redevelopment (ie: not Lopsided like Newcastle) , would shunt the pitch towards Shoreham Street to equalize the space around the footprint.
So we end up with approx 35,000 capacity for the Championship , of which I would give BLLT to away fans , even if I had to completely alter their access & egress and lock them in for 10 minutes at the end of the match.
32,000 is PLENTY for home fans in the Championship.
And we couldn't afford to do any more.
However , if we ever got to the Prem , "it's a whole new ball game".
The revenue from the gate is no longer our survival money , because of the TV & other income.
So we can afford to CLOSE sections of the ground for redevelopment and not worry too much about loss of gate money.
Somthing that's not possible in the Championship.
So at that stage , we can test the market for our Prem product and invest in the ground accordingly.
But where I differ with BTL is that such ground expense is not a short-term priority.
"If you build it , they will come" WILL NOT WORK AT SUFC.
Because if we want to compete at the top end of the Championship , we'll need every penny for players.
And if we've spent it on a snazzy ground , and are in the bottom half of the Championship , we'll have an embarrasing number of empty seats.
Just like the pigs have for years & years.
And who wants to be like a pig in oceans of empty seats ?
And if we spend it on the ground
