West Ham manager Slaven Bilic has stated that the Hammers need more than just the Olympic Stadium to be a big Premier League club.
The 54,000 seater stadium has already played host to two Rugby World Cup games and the third will be played there when Ireland take on Italy on Sunday.
The tournament has given West Ham fans an insight of what to expect from their delightful new ground when they move into it ready for the 2016/17 season.
If you go to a nightclub and have to pay hundreds of pounds to walk in, you can’t go in with £100 – you’re going to have to go to the toilet to drink water. We have a great stadium now but the stadium by itself will not make us a big club.
Today you can’t become big without one but it’s not only the stadium, it is everything – the whole infrastructure. When you are building houses you need a school, a hospital, a cinema, a swimming pool – it’s the same with a club.
When you’re building a club you need a team to match that. You can’t expect the same team to play better just because you move into a stadium.
The Hammers have enjoyed a strong start to this Premier League season as they ride a five-game unbeaten run in the league.
Ahead of the big move to the new stadium, the owners were desperate to secure top-flight football, therefore sacked former manager Sam Allardyce and brought in Bilic.
The Hammers could be looking at a European spot for next season and with the football that Bilic has his team playing, it could be done in style.
We have London, the Premier League, West Ham is a good club – but this isn’t going to be enough to attract big, big players.
Dimitri Payet is this kind of player. Very few people believed he would come here. And we had big players sign for West Ham before.
For example I signed for West Ham – I am joking – but (Paolo) Di Canio was a big name.
It’s a great step up for the club but you can’t say just because of the stadium we suddenly become a big gun – but we have a good platform to build on.
