It’s over 20 years since Ards left their long-standing Castlereagh Park home and, as 2023 comes to a close, they remain without a permanent place to call their own.
Perhaps for not much longer, though.
After spells playing their football at Cliftonville’s Solitude in north Belfast, Dixon Park in Ballyclare and Carrick Rangers’ Taylors Avenue, they have now spent more than a decade playing at Clandeboye Park in neighbouring Bangor but could be set to return to their traditional home before long.
In 2021, the club declared that they were hoping “to sign a 125-year lease on a six-acre plot of council land near the Portaferry Road”, and the following year, that lease was agreed and long-awaited plans to build their new ground could come to fruition.
The site to hold the foundations of Castlereagh Park’s spiritual successor – located on the Floodgates just a couple hundred metres from where their old stadium used to be prior to its demolition in 2002 – sparked excitement; a landmark moment, as for the first time in a nomadic near-quarter of a century, the highest-ranking club in the Ards Peninsula would actually be playing at home.
“This agreement is a massive boost for our football club and the entire Ards area, as at long last, we have land to call our own in Newtownards,” explained chairman Warren Patton. “This is a big step forward on our journey home.
“We will now begin the process of securing the funding necessary to build a new stadium. To do this, we will work to identify new partners who can help us on the next stage of our journey.”
Plans to construct a state-of-the-art 2,000-capacity venue fit for hosting football matches at the top level have already been laid out, and there’s no denying that when the project is finalised, it will contribute hugely to a Peninsula scene that is on the rise. 2023 was a year of feelgood tales on that front.
Greyabbey’s Rosemount Rec, for instance, gained promotion to the top-flight of the Amateur League for the first time ever and head to Premiership outfit Loughgall in the Irish Cup Fifth Round. They also were a penalty shoot-out away from a historic Intermediate Cup showpiece, nudged out by St Oliver Plunkett in a nail-biting semi-final at Blanchflower Park in April.
Comber Rec’s participation in the Steel and Sons Cup Final, where they will bid to take down Crumlin Star and clinch their second success in the illustrious Christmas showpiece, couples a Border Cup decider versus Willowbank. Millisle’s Abbey Villa, meanwhile, are third-place and merely five points down on Sirocco Works – with no fewer than eight games in hand – in the NAFL Division 1A as they aim to join Rosemount at the Premier level in 2024, while Newtownards’ 1st Bangor are sixth and hold similar aspirations.
Ards Rangers have been a top-level Amateur League campaigner for as long as the living mind stretches back, while Portavogie Rangers are also chasing promotion in Division 1C with their second-place standing at present.
And stepping away from the Amateur League and into the big time, a plethora of Peninsula homegrowns including Larne prodigy Dylan Sloan, on-loan Dungannon Swifts marksman Matthew Lusty and Glentoran wing wizard Aaron Wightman are making positive strides that have further fuelled the optimism for a bright future.
So, should Ards be able to return to their core base in the not-too-distant future and implement their next steps in the place they call home, that would be the cherry on top of what has been a time of serious progress throughout the region.
It would bring the core fanbase together, a hub from which the club can act on their ambitions concisely and, as their supporters would hope, rekindle some of the glory days of old – celebrating them in Newtownards.
Featured image from Ards FC Media.
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