Love Street, Scotland (1894–2009)
St. Mirren Football Club
Love Street was the stadium of the Scottish club St. Mirren Football Club in the city of Paisley between 1894 and 2009. Despite having become the stadium of St. Mirren since the early years of its history (founded in 1877), Love Street it was not the first ground that the club hosted its games in a fixed way. From 1882 to 1894, St. Mirren rented Westmarch, a stadium located in the Ferguslie Park region. After the stadium owner imposed a 100% increase in the rent, the club started looking for alternatives, and found the land located on Love Street as the one that best fit its ambitions. Although the conditions of the field and its dimensions were not the ideal, the land was very close to the city center, and was already known for hosting entertainment events, such as circuses of the time, which made St. Mirren understand that it was a good opportunity to get new fans. The contract provided for the use of the field for 10 years, but the good adaptation to the site meant that St. Mirren bought the land in 1905 and invested in the infrastructure of Love Street.
In 1920, St. Mirren had plans to acquire a neighboring lot with the intention of investing in new bleachers on Love Street that would take it to an audience capacity of 60,000 people, which would make it one of the main stadiums in the country. However, the plan had to be discontinued, since in 1921 the Great Depression in the United Kingdom period began, which made the club afraid to invest an amount of its budget, maintaining the stadium with a capacity of 10,000 people. .
Love Street was part of the most remarkable moments in the history of St. Mirren, such as the three victories of the Scottish Cup and the first four victories of the Scottish Championship, second division of the national league. In 2006, after the Scottish Championship’s last win on Love Street, the Scottish Premiership demanded that St. Mirren carry out several renovations to the stadium so that it could host its matches there during the next season. After that, St. Mirren understood that the stadium was already becoming obsolete for the club’s future ambitions, and decided to enter a process for the sale of Love Street and construction of a new stadium in another location. In 2007, an agreement was announced with the British multinational Tesco, which involved the sale of the stadium to the company, which would provide the financial contribution for the construction of a new stadium in a nearby region on Greenhill Road.
The last match on Love Street took place on January 3, 2009, in a 0x0 draw between St. Mirren and Motherwell. Days later, on January 21, 2009, St. Mirren made the first match at their new stadium, St.Mirren Park.
