Everton will not play competitive fixtures at their new stadium until the 2025-26 season, the club’s interim CEO Colin Chong said on Friday, but he stressed the late start is not due to construction delays.
“Firstly, and to be absolutely clear, our decision to not move in mid-season is not because of a construction delay,” Chong wrote.
“It is a club decision driven by a combination of commercial insight, a comprehensive review of the logistics required, an analysis of the potential impact upon our football operations and, importantly, fan feedback sourced as part of our recent stadium migration survey, which was completed by almost 10,000 Evertonians.”
“Some of our test events will involve crowds of varying capacities, while others will need to be operationally focused and only involve our own staff,” he said.