HUDDERSFIELD GIANTS owner-chairman Ken Davy has abandoned plans to buy The Shay in neighbouring Halifax.

And it’s left supporters of the Super League club wondering where their team will play home matches next year.

The Giants have said they will at the end of this season leave the Accu Stadium, now owned and operated by Huddersfield Town Football Club, where they have played since 1994 but with a 24,000-plus capacity, they believe is too big for their needs.

In the long term, Davy wants to build an alternative 8,000-capacity venue elsewhere in the Huddersfield area by 2030.

He had hoped that could be at the nearby site of a former gasworks, but that proposal has fallen through as Kirklees Council consider the land key to their bid to continue the development of a health innovation and digital technology zone.

His initial plan was to use The Shay, already home to Rugby League club Halifax Panthers and football team FC Halifax Town, in the interim.

With cash-strapped owners Calderdale Council keen to sell the 10,400-capacity venue in a bid to help balance their books, in January 2025 Davy announced his plan to purchase and bring it up to Super League standard.

A new £800,000 hybrid pitch able to sustain use by three teams was installed last year, with the Giants supremo providing interest-free loans to the two Halifax clubs to cover their share of the cost, half of which has been met by a Football Foundation grant.

However there has been opposition to the sale both from new Reform councillors who were elected last month with the party gaining control of the authority and now reviewing the matter, as well as campaigners who want The Shay to remain under Calderdale ownership.

While playing at the venue as tenants remains a possibility, Davy announced: “I have informed Calderdale Council that I will not be progressing my interest in purchasing The Shay Stadium, Halifax.

“From the very beginning I made it absolutely clear to the council, the football and rugby clubs and indeed, the various supporters groups I have met, that I would only continue my interest in The Shay Stadium, and sport in Halifax in general, if my input and involvement was welcome.

“Unfortunately, in the respect of a small minority, it is abundantly clear that this is not the case.

“This outcome is obviously disappointing. I am however especially disappointed for the wider sporting community of Calderdale, as I had hoped to develop The Shay into a truly multi-sport centre for the community of Calderdale as a whole, rather than just the around six percent who currently use it to attend rugby or football matches.

“The Shay does at least now have the benefit of a new state-of-the-art pitch, which the football and rugby clubs, and the council, assure me would not have happened without my involvement, and I wish everyone in Calderdale every success in the future.

“In respect of the Giants, my withdrawal changes very little. I suspect the Shay would probably still be a rental option for us, given its need for income, and that goes for a number of other sites in and around our area.

“In addition our challenge to Kirklees Council remains in that we need a permanent site to secure our long-term future.”

It’s also been suggested that the Giants could consider playing at Dewsbury Rams’ FLAIR Stadium which, with the Accu currently unavailable due to a concert having taken place and the subsequent start of pitch maintenance work, will stage Saturday’s Super League game against Toulouse Olympique.