DEWSBURY RAMS are looking forward to running out at a new-look FLAIR Stadium next season as Super League neighbours Huddersfield, who are taking control of the venue and extensive site, continue what will be a £10 million-plus upgrade.
The Giants, who had been based ten miles away at the Accu Stadium, will play at Dewsbury until they can construct a smaller ground of their own back in Huddersfield, and need to bring the Owl Lane facility up to top-flight standards.
Initially that means alterations to the pitch, improved floodlighting, refurbishment of the existing stands and new hospitality suites, dressing rooms and press facilities.
And Huddersfield plan to build a new stand at the currently unused end of the stadium to raise the capacity from 5,000 to 8,000.
Permission will be required from Kirklees Council, who also hold the key to developing any site for a ground back in Huddersfield.
The Dewsbury venue opened at the same time as what is now the Accu (then Alfred McAlpine Stadium) for the start of the 1994-95 season.
The club’s first match at the £1.5 million ground on the site of a former colliery was a 76-8 Second Division victory over Barrow in front of 3,427.
Dewsbury had left Crown Flatt, which was a mile away from their present base and where they had played since 1876, in 1991, although the ground had been badly damaged by fire three years before, with the stand, which dated back to 1914, memorabilia and documentary records being destroyed.
The site was sold for housing and the club was based at neighbours Batley’s Mount Pleasant (now the Fox’s Biscuits Stadium) until the new stadium was built.
Dewsbury will also have a player-share partnership with Huddersfield.