Living life like an Airbnb-hopper is grating on everyone at the Western Sydney Wanderers – including chief executive John Tsatsimas. But the short-term pain for the A-League club will be worth it, he insists, once they move into their brand-new digs at Parramatta.
Tsatsimas conceded the pitch offered up by Spotless Stadium on Friday night – patchy, uneven and covered in shards of plastic, screws and nails – was not good enough. The Wanderers have three more games left to endure at the oval-shaped ground.
No regrets: Wanderers CEO John Tsatsimas says members spoke loud and clear when they voted for Sydney Olympic Park as their temporary home.Credit:Katherine Griffiths
"I'm not going to be talking about our discussions with the venue, other than to say that we need to be on an elite playing surface that reflects the elite competition that we participate in," Tsatsimas told Fairfax Media.
"This competition is exhibited overseas. We need to make sure that our league, our venues and our sporting landscape is represented appropriately on a world stage. On Friday, probably we fell short of that."
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While the Wanderers dealt with the fall-out of the Spotless shambles, Sydney FC's 19,000-strong crowd at a sold-out Jubilee Stadium on Sunday suggested they will far better placed to deal with their own displacement ahead of the demolition of Allianz Stadium.
But Tsatsimas noted it Wanderers fans who made it overwhelmingly clear through a survey conducted two years ago that they wanted matches played at Sydney Olympic Park while they wait for their new home to be built.
"It was the choice of our members and we need to respect that. Hindsight's a wonderful thing… the elements we've had to confront certainly weren't apparent to all and sundry at that time," he said.
"We're sick of it too. We feel like an Airbnb at the moment. But we need to understand as well, the only reason there is a new Western Sydney Stadium is because the fans and the club and the region has come together and made this club what it is, so that it was able to lobby to have that stadium.
"We're going through some pain at the moment … that's the price we pay. It's not ideal, but there's light at the end of the tunnel."
Vince is a sports reporter for The Sydney Morning Herald.
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