Europe 1 with AFP // Photo credit: Xose Bouzas / Hans Lucas / Hans Lucas via AFP 7:43 p.m., February 9, 2024

Valérie Pécresse would like to help Paris Saint-Germain find a “new stadium”. An announcement which follows the refusal of the mayor of Paris to sell the Parc des Princes to the club of the capital, which wishes to acquire it in order to expand it to 60,000 places, against 48,000 today. 

The Ile-de-France region chaired by Valérie Pécresse wants to help PSG "find a new stadium" after the club's "breakup" with the Paris town hall which does not want to sell the Parc des Princes, his entourage said on Friday. AFP, confirming information from Le Parisien.

“PSG has always been a Parisian and Yvelinois club”

The elected LR wants to "seize the Public Land Establishment of Ile-de-France", which manages land in the region, in order to "launch research corresponding to the specifications of the PSG", she asserts in daily. This support from the region must be provided under “two conditions”, underlines Valérie Pécresse: that local elected officials approve the approach and that the site is accessible by public transport. “We cannot leave PSG in an impasse,” explains Valérie Pécresse, who wants to “open up all the possibilities for a stadium”.

“PSG has always been a Parisian and Yvelines club,” recalls the elected official from Yvelines. “But we will also look in Hauts-de-Seine, Val-d’Oise, Essonne…”. Valérie Pécresse insists on a “sustainable installation”, underlines those around her to AFP. According to the same source, the president of the capital club, Nasser Al-Khelaïfi, requested a meeting. This proposal “comes into play from the moment a break has been made with the City”, insists those around him.

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The Parisian club, engaged until the end of 2043 in a thirty-year lease with the Town Hall, owner of the Parc des Princes, considers that the acquisition of the stadium is essential to carry out its expansion project to 60,000 seats, compared to around 48,000 currently. In January 2023, Anne Hidalgo closed the door by announcing that the Park “will not be sold”. On Tuesday, the Paris Council reinforced this position by asking that the modernization of the enclosure "be carried out within the framework of an assembly (...) not involving its transfer".

"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 on from the Park ", replied Nasser Al-Khelaïfi, Thursday on the sidelines of the UEFA congress. The door of Paris town hall is "still open" to PSG, for which "there are other solutions" than sale, Anne Hidalgo's deputy for sport, Pierre Rabadan, immediately reiterated. As for the option of "building a stadium, in Montigny-le-Bretonneux or elsewhere, it is ten years in the best case", underlined the former rugby player.