London Irish to leave Reading’s Madejski and move to new Brentford Community Stadium from 2020

The current Championship club has agreed a deal to ground share with Brentford Football Club and hope to return to the Premiership before they relocate in the summer of 2020

London Irish will move to the new Brentford Community Stadium from 2020 (Getty)

London Irish have announced that they will leave the Madejski Stadium in Reading to move to the new 17,250-seat Brentford Community Stadium from the start of the 2020/21 season after agreeing a deal to ground share with the Championship football club.

Having first moved to the Madejski in 2000 after spending a year sharing the Twickenham Stoop with Harlequins, Irish will end their stay in Reading after two decades, having made the decision to return to the south-west of London and their ‘spiritual home’.

Irish had to leave The Avenue in Sunbury after 68 years there in order to comply with Premiership Rugby’s stadium requirements in 1999, given that it could only hold a 6,600 capacity crowd. The move to Reading opened the club up to the 24,000-plus Madejski Stadium, but while Irish came close to selling the stadium out against Wasps in March 2008, crowd attendances have fallen considerably following the club’s relegation in 2016 and again last season.

However, the club has made clear its plan to re-establish itself as a Premiership regular and currently lead the second-tier RFU Championship by four points. It’s hoped that by the time they move back to London, they will have managed to remain in the top flight.

Brentford’s new stadium, which will be located north of Kew Bridge and is currently under construction, is due to be ready for the start of the 2020/21 season. While it is a smaller capacity venue than the Madejski, Irish president Mick Crossan hopes that it is a move that will help to reinvigorate the club’s support and return the type of attendances that they saw a decade ago.

“In moving to the Brentford Community Stadium we feel confident that we will be able to attract a larger supporter base to join us as we build for the future, reaching out to our previous west London catchment area, to Greater London and the Irish diaspora throughout the UK,” Crossan said in a statement.

“We are therefore very pleased to have agreed this deal with Brentford's management and are looking forward to working closely with them to make the Brentford Community Stadium an outstanding home for us. Our special thanks to Matthew Benham, Cliff Crown, Mark Devlin, Conor Hayes, Alan Walsh and all at Brentford Football Club for facilitating this partnership. I can't wait to see the team run out to play its first game in 2020!

“The stadium will be an outstanding venue. It is the right size in a great location and will provide a superb match-day experience for our supporters and sponsors alike. We’re looking forward to recapturing the special atmosphere and all-day experience we had at The Avenue, where ‘The Craic’ was born.”

The new stadium will make the club more accessible to those fans based in London, with both Kew Bridge train station and Acton Town Tube station within a stone’s throw of the new ground while District Line stops Gunnersbury and Kew Gardens are also within walking distance. It will also vastly cut down the distance between their home stadium and the current training ground, which is still located in Sunbury.

“The fantastic facilities at Brentford Community Stadium will complement our unrivalled training base at Hazelwood, which is the spiritual home of the whole London Irish family all the way from the minis and juniors in the amateur club up to the professional team, and having the two within easy reach of each other was a significant part of our decision-making process” Crossan added.

“The excellent transport links will mean that our existing and new supporters alike will find the stadium very accessible. We will be working hard with our existing supporters including all those based in the Thames Valley to highlight the various routes into the Brentford/Kew area given the adjacent M4 and existing train and Underground services, as well as the new Crossrail connection which opens in 2019 linking Reading into west London.”

London Irish will leave the Madejski Stadium after 20 years in Reading (Getty)

The move has also been given the blessing by Reading Football Club, with chief executive Nigel Howe admitting that they “agree” with the decision to leave the Madejski at the end of the 2019/20 season. Irish could yet bring one more year of Premiership rugby to Reading should they secure promotion this season, with the Rugby Football Union confirming that they will not scrap relegation from the top flight this season.

“As a club, we have thoroughly enjoyed a strong long-term relationship with London Irish who have been excellent partners for nearly two decades at Madejski Stadium,” Howe said.

“We understand and agree with their decision to move back to their heartland and appreciate that, as Brentford prepare to move into new stadium facilities being built in closer proximity to their Sunbury training base, this is the right time for them to relocate and play their rugby closer to their club’s London roots.

“We naturally look forward to working alongside London Irish during the remaining months of their tenancy and everyone at Reading Football Club would like to wish them every success for the future.”