By Tony Quested (Daily Star)

Millwall's future is in the melting pot as the First Division surprise packets consider whether to quit their home at The Den.

The Lions face the prospect of having to move out within the next three years to keep pace with slick city neighbours like Arsenal and Spurs.

Millwall are now being linked with two sites - and one of them would literally involve selling their fans down the river!'

It's been suggested that they could move to a site on Isle of Dogs-the club's birthplace. Although the land is the other side of Thames, a rail link could be provided through the proposed Docklands Light Railway which would open access to Greenwich, Lewisham and Deptford.

Millwall have already been asked by Lewisham Council to leave The Den and build a new stadium half a mile down the road on the Bermondsey border. 

Emotional

But directors are also considering plans for a major revamp of The Den. Chief Executive Graham Hortop said no decision has been taken. But he didn't think a move to the Isle of Dogs was likely. "It would be a great emotional wrench. A move of stadium is a big enough pull for supporters but the inconvenience, at least, has to be kept to minimum, I don't think we would want to move out of the area."

Lewisham Council has also pledge to "move heaven and earth" to keep Millwall in the borough. Hortop revealed that it was proving hard for the club to develop off the pitch as quickly as the playing side.

"We are an established First Division club and have to improve our facilities Our playing success has taken off beyond all expectations, but it costs a lot of money to redevelop a football stadium.

by Steve Stammers and Malcolm Withers

And they intend to use the money they will raise by Issuing shares to move to a new stadium and challenge soccer's rich elite.

•  Cold Blow Lane: The Home of Millwall FC

The only other club to have gone public are Tottenham, who did so in 1983. Now Millwall, the Docklands club with the humble Image, are to forge an unlikely association with the City.

In the next four weeks they will announce ambitious plans aimed at raising £5 million by selling 25 million 20 pence shares.

Ronnie Jacobson, senior partner for stockbrokers Jacobson, Townsley, and a Spurs supporter for 40 years, said today: "We hope to be offering the shares to the public during October."

There will be special terms for Millwall supporters, who will be able to buy a minimum of 500 shares costing £100.

The maximum holding allowed will be 50,000 shares, costing £10,000. The cash will help to finance the club's plans to move to a multi-purpose new stadium in the next three years.

Lewisham Council, provide leisure facilities which it would be Impossible to Install at The Den.

The Millwall chairman is Reg Burr, who is financial consultant to Cleves Investment. Cleves will be financial advisers to the newly named Millwall Holdings PLC

"Nothing more can be done at The Den," said Burr today. "The who Idea is to secure the future of the club. Last season our income was just under £3 million of which £1.2 million came through the turnstiles. If you wrote out a league table of gates in the First Division at the end of last season, we would have been fourth from bottom. If you then did another table of cash per head from spectators, we would have been relegated."

"There were two steps we could take. We could have stayed as we were and ended up in the Third Division after having to sell our best players. Or we could raise additional capital that would help us get new players and help the move to a new, purpose-built stadium."

"This scheme is the only way that we feel we can maintain our progress as a major football club by increasing revenues."

"What we are aiming to do is build a more broadly based leisure group."

But Burr Insists that the ordinary fan will not be excluded from a stake in the future of the revamped club."

"I will give them a chance to have a say in the club - although I do hear their opinions every Saturday!"

Burr is bracing himself for what he regards as inevitable criticism from those who will suggest that he and other board members are motivated by self-profit.

"I suppose we will get some stick but really this is the only way for the club to go, The criticism will come from ill-informed people. Personally, I am very excited about the whole project. It will strengthen our financial hand."

And Burr made it clear that there will be no ground sharing and no artificial surface.

Lions chairman Reg Burr is already assured a place in Millwall folklore as the man who master-minded the club's triumphant march into the First Division after a 103-year wait.

By Rob Bowden

Now Burr is determined to safeguard Millwall's coveted position amongst the country's elite, by dragging the club, kicking and screaming into the 1990s.

Burr's ambitious plans include a £5 million share issue, and most controversially they mean moving from the Den, Millwall's home for nearly 80 years.

The Lions chief is adamant it's the only way forward for a club whose gale receipts will never provide them with the son of resources enjoyed by Liverpool, Manchester United, Arsenal and co. But his plans have already been slammed by some supporters who fear that the club's unique spirit wouldn't survive a move from the Den, and that a share issue will surrender Millwall into the hands of business entrepreneurs more interested in profit than success on the field.

Burr believer those fears are groundless, born out of an understandable emotional attachment to the Den and a lack of understanding about the club's financial problems.

In today's SLP Sport he spells out his vision of the future and explains why the club must move from its beloved New Cross home.

Instead of moving from the Den a lot of supporters would rather see the ground improved and modernised. Why isn't that possible?

"It simply isn't viable! The Football League and Football Association have recommended that all First Division grounds should be 60-75 per seated. If that recommendation is included in Lord Justice Taylor's final report on the Hillsborough tragedy it is likely to become law by 1992 or 1993."

"It throws up the possibility of us being kicked out of the First Division, not because we aren't good enough, but because our ground doesn't come up to scratch and that's something I am determined to prevent."

"To bring the Den into line with that all-seater recommendation would cost between £15 and £20 million and there is simply no way we can raise that sort of money."

"When the idea of moving from the Den was first raised I thought it was a pipedream which would never come off, but now it's not an option it's absolutely imperative.

Do you understand why people are so reluctant to leave the Den?

"Of course! I've had letters from people who say that when they stand on the terraces at the Den they feel the strength of their fathers and grandfathers."

"I can understand that, but would those same people want to stand on the terraces and watch Third, Fourth or even non-League football because that's what the future holds if we don't move."

"Far too many people have worked themselves into the ground to get this club into the First Division for us to give up lightly."

THE Lions were highly successful during their first season in the top flight, and you've started the current campaign in similar fashion, so why are any changes necessary?

"John Docherty and his staff have done an absolutely marvellous job. I'm the first to acknowledge that and I for one don't think we have seen the best of this side yet.

"But the harsh facts are that despite last season's success our total income was just under £3 million of which £1.2 million came through the turnstiles.

"Unless we have a decent Cup run it is hard to envisage our gate receipts will increase dramatically this season - and of course you can't budget on Cup runs."

"In today's transfer market improving on our current squad would cost John £600,000 - £700,000 a time minimum, on our current income that sort of money isn't readily available.

"We've got a squad of players who are tremendously loyal to this club. But if we don't match the wages other people are paying we won't be able attract new players or keep the ones we've got."

"If that happens the result, inevitably, would be a decline in standards and a return to the Second or Third Divisions."

"I'd love nothing better than to be able to stay at the Den. I don't need all the work that moving to a new ground will create."

• Reg Burr: "I can understand that (Supporters who say they won't go to the new ground), but would those same people want to stand on the terraces and watch Third, Fourth or even non-League football because that's what the future holds if we don't move."

"But unless someone can come up with a way of dramatically increasing the revenue we get at the Den we have got to go."

How will moving from the Den increase the club's revenue?

"Moving from the Den wouldn't necessarily improve our crowds, but the facilities we'd be able to offer people would boost our income per capita."

"There would be restaurants, bars, executive clubs and a whole range of other leisure facilities all designed to provide extra revenue."

"You have acknowledged the importance of the Den's special atmosphere. Would that survive if the club moves down the road to Senegal Fields?

"I'm sure it would. I believe that atmosphere comes primarily from the supporters and if we get the plans for Senegal Fields right I'm confident it can be preserved."

"We have already rejected a couple of plans because they are too 'high-tech' We don't want a state of the art ground, we simply want a smart modern one where people can watch football in comfort and safety."

"When the Den was built most people had outside toilets. Our fans don't live in the same conditions they did 60 odd years ago, so why should they have to put up with ancient facilities when they watch a football match?"

"I believe people should have the right to watch football standing up if they want to, so the new ground won't be all sealer and it won't have a plastic pitch."

Will the money from the proposed share issue be used to finance the new ground?

"No, that was what some papers said when the story broke but it's not the case. I can't say much about the share issue until all the technicalities have been sorted out but basically we want Millwall Holdings PLC to develop into a broad based leisure group."

Why do you think your proposals have upset a section of the supporters?

"People are always afraid of changes, but we have got to take some courageous decisions and move with the times. I don't want to alter the character of the club. The last thing I want to do is change Millwall into a yuppie club."

"What I do want is for us to develop into a major force, a club which can be compared favourably with the likes of Spurs and Arsenal."

Scottish Architects The Miller Partnership (RMJM) are testing the feasibility of a 'Shoestring' football stadium costing just £12 million.

The Stadium for First Division Millwall in Lewisham, South East London, will only go ahead if the club can sell its existing ground with lucrative planning consent for Housing.

Millwall Chairman Reg Burr told BD this week that if negotiations broke down he would consider taking the club out of Lewisham, possibly to nearby Southwark.

Miller and Engineers Thorburn associates will present studies to Millwall next month indicating the feasibility of an £8-12 million stadium with a 25,000-30,000 capacity at Senegal Fields, in New Cross, close to the club's home, The Den.

Burr said: "We can't talk about a hi-tech stadium with a retractable roof. That's all nonsense. We want a bread and butter ground."

The report also says the club could raise £2 million from the sale of executive boxes at the new ground and there may be grants available from the Sports council, The Football Grounds Improvement Trust and possibly the European Community. But DoE officials have told Burr there is no chance of City Grant support.

The RMJM report, a copy of which has been obtained by BD, examined the possibility of a 30,000 capacity stadium at Senegal Fields costing £16.6 million. This would involve Lewisham selling land worth up to £10.4 million to help fund the stadium, but this would still leave a £6 million shortfall.

Lewisham officials say the council cannot give Millwall either money or land under the new Local Government Act, without setting aside more money to pay off its huge debts.

Next Page: More on planning the move and financing the deal and more pictures of the construction of the New Den or 'The New London Stadium' as the project was called. Next Page the Architects Journal Review of the Project and Stadium.