Atletico Madrid say they are stunned by local council plans to demolish their Vicente Calderon stadium and create a riverside park.
“It’s the first I’ve heard of the idea,” Atletico Madrid president Enrique Cerezo told the Onda Madrid radio station.
“If the local council is planning to demolish the stadium, then I imagine that they would consult us.”
Madrid mayor Alberto Ruiz-Gallardon claimed on Tuesday the winning proposal to regenerate the area around the city’s Manzanares river would involve the demolition of Atletico’s ground.
Ruiz-Gallardon aditted that the plan was dependent on the club agreeing to the proposal.
“At the moment it is an idea, a proposal, which the council will use as a basis to decide on the definitive project and there still different options open to us,” he said.
The council and the club discussed this year a possible relocation of the Atletico ground to the city’s La Peineta stadium.
“We said we’d continue the talks after the summer, but we haven’t done that,” Cerezo said.
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