“It’s over now, we want to move from the Parc des Princes,” says PSG president Nasser Al-Khelaifi – Libération

The Qatari boss of Paris Saint-Germain announced, after the UEFA executive committee held in Paris this Thursday, February 8, that the club would leave its historic setting, two days after the refusal by the Paris Council of any sales process.

A little sentence that risks making Parisian aficionados jump. Present for the UEFA executive committee in Paris, PSG president Nasser al-Khelaïfi, took stock of the Parc des Princes issue, announcing to journalists: “It’s too easy to say now that the stadium is no longer for sale. We know what we want, we wasted years trying to buy the Park. It’s over now, we want to move out of the Park.”

An exit which comes two days after the vote of the Paris council to confirm that the stadium in the 16th arrondissement of the capital was not for sale, an epilogue to eight years of discussions with the club to try to find a solution. The club had for a time considered buying the Stade de France, before backpedaling at the beginning of January, in order to concentrate on buying the Park, or on the construction of a new stadium.

Emergency appointment

Nasser al-Khelaïfi therefore wanted, through this exit, to increase the pressure on urban stakeholders and in particular the City of Paris. The club now ensures that it activates all valid options to build a new enclosure as quickly as possible.

PSG, engaged until the end of 2043 in a thirty-year long lease with the town hall, owner, considers the acquisition of the stadium essential to carry out its expansion project to 60,000 seats – compared to around 48,000 seats currently.

But “the discussion stopped the day they conditioned this expansion work on a pure and simple buyout,” according to sports assistant Pierre Rabadan. Since then, the Parisian executive has “continuously asked for a return to dialogue, which we still do not have today,” admitted the former Stade Français rugby player. An emergency meeting is scheduled for this Thursday according to the Team to move forward very concretely on this hypothesis, with dedicated internal teams.