First brick laid in £5.2 million John Jenkins Stadium

The first bricks have been laid in the John Jenkins Stadium redevelopment in Portsmouth. 

Portsmouth In The Community’s (PITC) chief executive Clare Martin visited the Moneyfields FC ground in Copnor this morning to see the progress being made in the redevelopment programme.

The John Jenkins Stadium is to be named after John Jenkins MBE, a second world war veteran who landed on Gold Beach in 1944 as part of the Allied invasion of Normandy and died in 2019, a month after his 100th birthday.

After laying a brick in the stadium, Martin described the moment as one of the most ‘overwhelming’ in her 21-year career at PITC, the charitable arm of Portsmouth Football Club.

The brick in question will become part of a clubhouse which will be situated between two full size artificial football pitches at the John Jenkins Stadium, named in honour of the city’s D-Day veteran.

PITC will be the sole landlords of the stadium after Moneyfields gave up ownership in exchange for a long-term lease agreement that guarantees their future. 

Moneyfields FC officials will clear the site this week to prepare it for the diggers to come in and rip up the pitch and begin the demolition of the clubhouse. 

The site will become a state-of-the-art facility that will be home to Moneyfields adult and youth teams, as well as Portsmouth Women. 

PITC teams will also call the John Jenkins Stadium home and have access to the weather pitches, gym, dance studio, boxing facilities, a clubhouse and many other facilities.

During term times, the charity will deliver coaching and training programmes to more than 6,000 students and pupils, amounting to at least 36,000 people each year.

Martin said: "We run sports, education, health, inclusion and disability projects in Portsmouth and the surrounding areas through a range of programmes and projects.

"We have over 50 full-time coaching and support staff, plus our casuals - in addition to a whole army of volunteers, but until now we haven't had a home and have had to beg, steal and borrow facilities around the city."

She commented in a Portsmouth FC press release: “This new development means that for the first time, we will have our own pitches, a home and a facility the city deserves.”