Kingsmeadow is a
football
Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...
stadium in
Norbiton
Norbiton is an area within the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames, London. It lies approximately east of Kingston upon Thames town centre, and from Charing Cross. Its main landmarks include Kingston Hospital, Kingsmeadow football stadium, ...
,
Kingston upon Thames
Kingston upon Thames (hyphenated until 1965, colloquially known as Kingston) is a town in the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames, southwest London, England. It is situated on the River Thames and southwest of Charing Cross. It is notable as ...
,
London
London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...
, which is used for home matches by
Chelsea Women and
Chelsea U21s. It was formerly the home of
Kingstonian F.C. and
AFC Wimbledon
AFC Wimbledon is an English professional Association football, football club, based in London Borough of Merton, Merton, London, that plays in the EFL League Two, after being relegated from the EFL League One following the 2021–22 EFL Leagu ...
and has a capacity of 4,850, with 2,265 seats.
History
The stadium was the home of
Kingstonian F.C. from 1989, when they built the entire complex on the site following the sale of their traditional Richmond Road ground. Kingstonian opened the ground with a friendly against
Queens Park Rangers
Queens Park Rangers Football Club, commonly abbreviated to QPR, is a professional football club based in Shepherd's Bush, West London, England, which compete in the . After a nomadic early existence, they have played home matches at Loftus Ro ...
. Following relegation from the
Conference
A conference is a meeting of two or more experts to discuss and exchange opinions or new information about a particular topic.
Conferences can be used as a form of group decision-making, although discussion, not always decisions, are the main p ...
, Kingstonian went into financial administration and both the club and ground were purchased by Rajesh Khosla and his son Anup.
AFC Wimbledon played at the stadium from their foundation in 2002 until their move to a new stadium on
Plough Lane
Plough Lane – named The Cherry Red Records Stadium for sponsorship reasons – is a football stadium in Wimbledon, south-west London, which has been the home of AFC Wimbledon since 3 November 2020. A groundshare with rugby league side London ...
in 2020;
Wimbledon F.C.
Wimbledon Football Club was an English football club formed in Wimbledon, south-west London, in 1889 and based at Plough Lane from 1912 to 1991. Founded as Wimbledon Old Centrals, the club were a non-League team for most of their history. ...
having
moved to
Milton Keynes
Milton Keynes ( ) is a city and the largest settlement in Buckinghamshire, England, about north-west of London. At the 2021 Census, the population of its urban area was over . The River Great Ouse forms its northern boundary; a tributary ...
in September 2003, becoming
Milton Keynes Dons
Milton Keynes Dons Football Club (), usually abbreviated to MK Dons, is a professional association football club based in Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, England. The team competes in , the third tier of the English football league system. The ...
in June 2004. AFC Wimbledon were in the
Combined Counties League
The Combined Counties Football League is a regional men's football league in south-eastern England with members in Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, Hampshire, Hertfordshire, Jersey, Kent, Middlesex, Oxfordshire, Surrey, and the western half and sou ...
at this time, but reached
Football League One
The English Football League One (often referred to as League One for short or Sky Bet League One for sponsorship purposes, and known as the Football League One from 2004 until 2016) is the second-highest division of the English Football Leag ...
in 2016.
![Kingsmeadow Stadium, Kingston upon Thames - geograph](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/76/Kingsmeadow_Stadium%2C_Kingston_upon_Thames_-_geograph.org.uk_-_1576732.jpg)
After one season as tenants of the Khoslas, AFC Wimbledon undertook to buy the leasehold to the ground. The club's owners,
the Dons Trust, launched a share issue to finance the purchase, which was closed the following summer. The club subsequently arranged for a commercial loan to clear the remaining debt to the Khoslas. Upon taking over the ground, its name was changed to the Fans' Stadium which remains the nickname of the ground today.
In November 2015, AFC Wimbledon supporters backed a proposal to sell the ground to
Chelsea F.C.
Chelsea Football Club is an English professional football club based in Fulham, West London. Founded in 1905, they play their home games at Stamford Bridge. The club competes in the Premier League, the top division of English football ...
, who were interested to use the ground for its youth teams and
women's team. The sale was hugely detrimental to Kingstonian, with them unable to play in a ground that was now too big and expensive for a non-league side and one which they no longer had any decision over. Kingstonian started a groundshare with
Leatherhead F.C. in 2017-8, and then to King George's Field in
Tolworth
Tolworth is a suburban area in the Surbiton district, Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames, Greater London. It is southwest of Charing Cross. Neighbouring places include Long Ditton, New Malden, Kingston, Surbiton, Berrylands, Hinchley Wood, ...
, sharing with
Corinthian-Casuals F.C.
Corinthian-Casuals Football Club is a association football, football club based in Tolworth in the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames, England. Affiliated to the London Football Association, they are currently members of the and play at Kin ...
from the 2018–19 season.
Kingsmeadow became the new home of Chelsea Women, beginning with the
2017–18 FA WSL season. AFC Wimbledon departed Kingsmeadow for the new
Plough Lane
Plough Lane – named The Cherry Red Records Stadium for sponsorship reasons – is a football stadium in Wimbledon, south-west London, which has been the home of AFC Wimbledon since 3 November 2020. A groundshare with rugby league side London ...
stadium in May 2020.
Ownership
The freehold of the site is owned by
Kingston Council. The leasehold, which safeguards the site for the borough's football team, was originally held by Kingstonian. After Kingstonian entered administration to avoid bankruptcy and lost the Kingsmeadow lease in October 2001, it was assigned in April 2002 by the administrators to a property developer, Rajesh Khosla, who was also by then owner of the club. In June 2003 he sold the lease to AFC Wimbledon, who at the time were already sub-tenants at the ground. Kingstonian secured a 25-year sub-tenancy agreement with AFC Wimbledon, with customary break clauses. The two clubs then operated a ground-sharing arrangement until 2017, with Kingstonian receiving preferentially cheap rental terms. The ground underwent various structural improvements and expansion during this period.
The ground is currently owned by Chelsea F.C., having purchased it from AFC Wimbledon in 2015, in order to use it for their women's and youth sides. Chelsea Women moved in for the start of the
2017–18 FA WSL 1 season.
Structure and facilities
![Kingsmeadow 2011 - geograph-2287343](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/05/Kingsmeadow_2011_-_geograph-2287343.jpg)
Kingsmeadow comprises the following stands (as they were named under AFC Wimbledon sponsorship):
* John Green Stand – (formerly the "Nongshim Stand") a newly built, covered behind-the-goal all-seater stand with 1,000 seats.
It was first sponsored by
Nong Shim Ltd.
Nongshim Co., Ltd. () is a South Korean food and beverage company headquartered in Seoul, South Korea. Nongshim was founded in 1965 under the name Lotte Food Industrial Company. The name was changed to Nongshim in 1978.
The current logo was pub ...
, South Korea's largest processed food manufacturer, whose UK head office is based locally in
New Malden
New Malden is an area in South West London, England. It is located mainly within the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames and the London Borough of Merton, and is from Charing Cross. Neighbouring localities include Kingston, Norbiton, Raynes ...
. The rebuilding of the stand increased the stadium capacity to approximately 4,850. It was renamed the "
John Green
John Michael Green (born August 24, 1977) is an American author, YouTube Content creation, content creator, podcaster, and philanthropist. His books have more than 50 million copies in print worldwide, including ''The Fault in Our Stars'' ( ...
Stand" for the 2015 season after the American bestselling author, whose keen interest in the team has led to a sponsorship agreement. Before the start of the 2015/2016 season the club installed a camera gantry above the stand in order to get different angles for replays to be shown on Dons Player.
* Paul Strank Stand – the all-seater main stand with 1,265 seats,
which also includes the stadium's changing rooms, offices, three bars and other facilities. The main stand was extended during the
2008–09 season, adding additional seats and also extending the roof to provide better protection from rain. It was also renamed the Paul Strank Stand at this time, after a supporter and benefactor of AFC Wimbledon.
* RyGas Stand – (formerly the "East Stand" and "Your Golf Travel Stand") is a partially covered shallow terrace along the length of the pitch, opposite the main Paul Strank Stand. This stand also holds the camera gantry at the stadium as well as the scoreboard.
* Chemflow End – (formerly the "Athletics End" and the "Tempest End") a covered behind-the-goal deep terrace. Its original name came from the Kingston Athletics Centre which sits directly behind the stand. The terrace was covered during the
2005–06 season and renamed the Tempest End in recognition of the sponsorship of Tempest Sports, Wimbledon's exclusive kit manufacturer since the club's inception, who had partially paid for the development. For the 2013–14 season the stand was renamed the EcoHouse End in a new sponsorship deal with the now defunct
EcoHouse Group, which had its main European office in nearby
Richmond
Richmond most often refers to:
* Richmond, Virginia, the capital of Virginia, United States
* Richmond, London, a part of London
* Richmond, North Yorkshire, a town in England
* Richmond, British Columbia, a city in Canada
* Richmond, California, ...
. During 2016 the stand was renamed the Chemflow End in another sponsorship deal.
As of October 2012, the stadium has a capacity of 4,850. It originally was designated to have a 6,299 capacity before modern safety requirements and ground improvements (such as re-profiling the Athletics End terrace and replacing the original terraced paddock in front of the main stand with seats) required the capacity to be reduced. Kingstonian's highest attendance at Kingsmeadow was 4,582 for a friendly against Chelsea on 22 July 1995. AFC Wimbledon's highest attendance at Kingsmeadow and the ground's overall record attendance was 4,870 against
Accrington Stanley
Accrington Stanley Football Club is a professional association football club based in Accrington, Lancashire, England. The club competes in League One, the third tier of the English football league system. They have spent their complete history ...
on 14 May 2016.
References
External links
Kingstonian FC Official websiteAFC Wimbledon Official websiteKingsmeadow at Football Ground Guide
{{Coord, 51, 24, 18.3, N, 0, 16, 55.0, W, type:landmark, display=title
1989 establishments in England
AFC Wimbledon
Chelsea F.C.
Chelsea F.C. Women
English Football League venues
Football venues in London
Women's Super League venues
Kingstonian F.C.
Sports venues completed in 1989
Sports venues in the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames