Look at the size of France, Argentina, New Zealand and Australia please.
No one in Wales even people from Swansea wants to watch an international match at the Liberty Stadium.
Why would they increase the size in the Liberty, you know that the Ospreys only get crowds of 7,000 right! That would make the atmosphere even more pathetic. Oh and the WRU don't own it so its not the WRU's "thinking". There's no point having bigger stadiums in Wales because the regions hardly fill them anyway. It would make the atmosphere even worse like the Super rugby sides.
It's a nice sentiment but there's no point in Wales. If they made a decent sized stadium in North Wales then i think it would be a good idea. But the South of Wales prefers to go to the Millenium.
I didn´t mean to suggest that Liberty Stadium is a owned by the Ospreys or the WRU. The issue of who owns the venue is, indeed a separate one.
New Zealand is an interesting example. Auckland - Hamilton is a bit over an hour by car whils Cardiff - Swansea is about an hour. Auckland is the home of the Blues and Hamilton is the home of the Chiefs. Cardiff is the home of the Blues and Swansea is the home of the Ospreys. Pretty similar examples here. Auckland has New Zealand´s premier stadium and Cardiff has Wales´premier one. Hamilton hosts one test per year, usually in June but it did land New Zealand vs South Africa in 2009. Swansea´s Liberty Stadium is a nice rugby stadium but is an international virgin. Hamilton has around 28,000 seats. Swansea has 20,000.
Population is interesting, considering Swansea is larger by 87,000.
Swansea = 230,000
http://www.swansea.gov.uk/index.cfm?articleid=32709
Hamilton = 143,000
http://hamilton.co.nz/page/pageid/2145832768
Increasing Liberty´s capacity would be a long term project to, potentially provide the city with a venue to host an international rugby match annually and be a World Cup stadium. Any RWC host, even a subhost, needs more than one big venue. Scotland has Glasgow´s Hampton Park to support Murrayfield, for instance. Liberty at 20,000 can work but it would be lucky to get more than two matches.
I am not Welsh but it does look like the people from outside of Cardiff are getting the short end of the stick and going off what you´ve said you are happy to! Sounds like a poor deal to me! New Zealanders would not tolerate all matches being played at Eden Park and nor should they.
As has been said by Feicarsinn, watching rugby is awful in a GAA stadium. Most of those bogball grounds are seeing their capacity reduced significantly next season on health and safety grounds. If I remember correctly, the one in Cork and the one in Thurles are being reduced to 30,000 and 38,000 respectively (from circa 40,000 and 50,000). The ones with roofs are glorified sheds. Without roofs they're merely slabs of cement and grass banks. That's not an image which should be projected to the world in the IRBs biggest competition. Ireland can't afford to get those stadiums up to scratch because, you may have heard, we owe around €500 trillion! Ireland can't host a World Cup.
I don't see any point in playing top internationals at Ravenhill or Thomond Park if Lansdowne Road will earn the IRFU more revenue. The sport is well developed in Belfast and Limerick so it's not as though taking games there will open the sport up to a new audience. There might be some support for a game against a tier 2 nation in a smaller stadium but cast your minds back two years when Ireland faced Canada in a half empty Thomond Park. If there's no appetite for that game, why would there be an appetite for a game against Fiji, Tonga, Samoa, Japan or somebody else on the same level?
Boosting Ravenhill's capacity and improving facilities is brilliant for Ulster's finances and will help bring Ulster towards the top tier of European club rugby. It's insignificant as an international venue unless Belfast finances a modern 35,000+ capacity stadium.
The Irish debt is a killer but if it did go down the path of being a dual host with either Scotland or Wales then the Republic would not spend too much and should walk away with a profit from ticket sales and plenty more from visitors. An example, being me. I found myself spending over NZ$50 before matches in New Zealand just for beer for myself and my father. It was a total rip off but all the bars did it and they were all full. Two Tiger beers at a Wellington bar was NZ$18. Really over priced. We all know the Irish like drinking and that people like to go to Ireland to drink.
Lets say Ireland does co-host and that it therefore needs five stadiums. I´d suggest it goes for one from each of Leinster, Munster, Connacht and Ulster and gives the fifth to Leinster with Dublin having two. i.e. Croke Park, Aviva Stadium, Thomond Park, Galway and Ravenhill. Thats three rugby stadiums and two GAA stadiums. Croke Park is outstanding and, going off photos Galway looks to be fine. If, I am wrong let me know!
So add five from Scotland or Wales (not both) and then Ireland can host a World Cup. Could be Edinburgh, Glasgow, Perth, Kilmarnock and Aberdeen.
Belfast should really have a larger stadium like you say. But Ravenhill, when fixed up, will be a good venue and at 18,000 is capable of hosting three World Cup matches just like Nelson did.
and Aberdeen are moving out of Pittodrie (were supposed to have started on the new one already, but that's deb for ya), to a new stadium in Loirston Loch
