Time to flush away Carlisle United 'facilities' we won't miss

The presence of David Tennant (who played Jimmy Murphy) at Carlisle’s ground lent enough glamour to obscure the tinge of shame that should have been felt at the place being considered a suitable replica for a ground more than 50 years in the past.

It’s not clear if the film crew made it as far as the Warwick Road End toilets. Chances are they’d have rejected those on the grounds of being too antiquated. That part of the stadium might have suited the set of One Million Years BC, or The Flintstones – or, at a push, the Trainspotting toilet scene – but little that was more advanced.

Alas, those primitive facilities behind United’s home terrace are not long for this world, following the Piatak takeover. Actually, delete the alas. This article could have been an attempt at dark humour at the impending loss of something so bad it’s held in a kind of wistful, disbelieving affection.

We could have imagined the Warwick bogs and their likely fate as a listed building falling victim to planning corruption. We might have depicted placard-holding fans at a picket line outside the ground, bravely protesting against the creeping introduction of soulless, modern gents’ urinals which do not simply involve a wall, a bit of drainpipe and the glorious Cumbrian elements.

But no. Let’s not go there – literally, if you value your health, and as a philosophical subject too. Let’s say what it really is: an emblem of a club and a ground that, all the while those ‘facilities’ have existed, could never tell itself (or us) with a fully straight face that it’s for the people, for the fans.

The next part of the #BPTour is the open air toilets in the Warwick Road End! pic.twitter.com/SDAWUDP5qO

— Carlisle United FC (@officialcufc) June 17, 2013

The Piataks, encouraged by some of those supporters, recognised this long before day one. The first game of their ownership brought the sight of some temporary, portable loos to the Warwick. Upgrading the inbuilt facilities is part of the long-term plan.

Throughout their courting of the club and in the early weeks of their tenure, United’s new owners have been at pains to be polite about the club’s traditions. This applies even to the Warwick lavatories. “That’s history too,” said Tom snr. “We want to keep a piece of that, so someone can come and bring their grandchild one day and say, ‘That’s what it used to be like’.”

The Piataks’ wish to respect the environment they have inherited is laudable, but I hope someone is in their ear to say: don’t worry about that bit, Tom. Bulldoze the lot of it, and show us exactly what a club looks like when it blasts away symbols of its shabby past and actually takes care of the people who pay to enter the building.

Tom Piatak and his family are at pains to be polite about some of United's traditions - but they need not bother on the subject of the Warwick 'facilities' (Image: Ben Holmes)

One of my regrets over 34 years watching United to date is that I’ve never stood on the Warwick for a game. As such the restrooms (haha) therein have only been witnessed rather than used. I do, though, remember similar luxuries in the Paddock of yesteryear and they could never be confused with the place the Queen used to powder her nose in Buckingham Palace either.

What does it say, really, when such things are allowed to last, permitted to remain the norm? What does it tell you when owners of reasonable to high wealth have not sorted it out but the new ones immediately have?

Imagine if directors, having taken in their pre-match meal in whatever well-appointed lounge they are ushered into week after week, then had to step out into something unprotected and primitive in order to seek relief before the 90 minutes of football ahead?

What if they were told it was good enough for them?

Exactly – wouldn’t happen. So it shouldn’t be good enough for supporters either. That should be a guiding principle for any proper ownership and if this seems a small thing in the big picture, sometimes it’s the detail that tells you the most. And if this is an obviously quick ‘win’ PR-wise for the Piataks too, it’s hardly one anyone can object to.

It has been interesting talking to United’s new controlling family in recent weeks about their plans, as well as the learning curve and their background in American sport – the difference and similarities they find in comparison to their new English venture.

Nick DeMasi observed that professional sport in the USA “feels very corporate” compared with the EFL, while Jenna Piatak said the “spectacle” aspect of the NFL could be seen to be “a little too much” when set against the “tradition and history” of English football clubs.

How they balance the good and the bad, what they introduce and what they don’t, will be fascinating. Anyone, though, who's attended American sport at a certain level knows they wouldn't stand for the kind of facility presented to United’s standing supporters under the Warwick’s three triangles.

United's home end has been revitalised by young fans in recent times - and it deserves facilities to match (Image: Barbara Abbott)

Jenna was pleasingly impolite when she described what she saw in United’s changing rooms too. “The showers and toilets were honestly despicable and a little scary,” she said. One trusts a family speaking in this way won’t spare the horses when it comes to doing the right thing by those who watch as well as those who play.

United, it can be accepted, have at many points in their recent and more distant history not been blessed with an excess of cash for Brunton Park’s maintenance. That, though, does not excuse the laissez-faire approach to how people have been expected to do what comes naturally behind the end of the ground which has otherwise been revitalised by young fans in the recent past.

The breezeblocks and gutter won’t be missed. The Piataks should know that certain bits of history are fine to scrawl across. Some walls just need to come tumbling down.