Wasps’ Kenny Logan says Kent has a great rugby heritage after plans announced for club to build a new stadium at Pedham Place in Swanley
Published: 05:00, 27 October 2023
Former Wasps favourite Kenny Logan has explained why the club want to relaunch in Kent.
Wasps revealed plans earlier this week to move to Pedham Place in Swanley, building a multi-use stadium, training ground and hotel.
The two-time European champions and six-time Premiership winners went into administration a year ago and were removed from the Premiership last year.
Their last base was Coventry, where they moved to in 2014, having spent most of their 156 years in London, they went to Wycombe in 2002.
There’s no timescale being put on their return but former Scottish international Logan, who is on the committee of the ‘new-born’ club, can see the potential in moving to Kent.
“It’s been a very tricky 12 months,” said 51-year-old Logan. “The club has disappeared and is trying to come back but we’ve realised over time that we need to find a home for this amazing brand.
“Sevenoaks (District Council) have been very welcome to us and we felt this was the best place. It’s got a great rugby heritage down there, there’s a lot of clubs and a lot of fans and there’s not a club anywhere near. We feel it’s a great opportunity for us.
“We did a lot of research. The thing about Wasps is we’ve moved around a lot and we need to find a home where we can stay for a long time and not go through what we’ve gone through.
“We’ve been looking at different parts of the country. The council approached us and we’d been looking at it anyway. After that, we started to look more and more into it and felt it was a good place for us to potentially move into.
“We have to get into the league which we are working on for the highest level we can.
“We’ll probably look to get to Kent as soon as we can as we want to start building a fanbase and hopefully build this new stadium.
“It will be a big opportunity in Kent to have a big arena, not just for rugby but other sports. You need a stadium that rugby can be played in, it needs to be commercially viable for other sports and conferences and concerts, different events, which is really important moving forward.”
Logan believes a return of the Wasps name to the world of rugby union will be welcomed, particularly by their predominantly London-based support.
“Most fans will be glad that Wasps is coming back,” he added.
“We’ve had to go to the place that we think Is best for the club. I don’t think we were totally welcome in Coventry.
“We feel the best for us is to move to Kent. This gives the fans hope that they can still see Wasps perform at a high level.
“The first point of failure was one person owning the club. We need to have multiple owners so if one disappears it doesn’t affect the club too much.
“We’re in a reasonably good position as we’re starting afresh, it’s a blank piece of paper, we’re going to connect a lot better with junior sections and the community - we’ve failed in the past on that - and we’re also looking at how we maximise London’s potential for a big club like Wasps.
“We were traditionally from London, we’re not far from there. Everyone’s always talked about why are Wasps not back in London, it’s very expensive in London and we need to look at the best place outside of it. We could be looking at potentially 25 minutes away on a train to watch first-class rugby.”
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KentOnline reporter