Bernard Orsman: Warriors in Albany - a bridge too far?

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If at first you don't succeed, try, try again.

That is the mantra being applied by Regional Facilities Auckland as it kicks around the curved ball that is the Auckland Stadium Strategy.

The initial strategy, positioning Eden Park as the region's premier sporting stadium and new home for the Warriors, was pitched as transformational for the city's underused and struggling stadiums.

The Warriors would shift to the "vacant lot" as sports columnist Chris Rattue labelled Eden Park, cricket would put down a new wicket at Western Springs, and speedway move to Mt Smart Stadium. North Harbour got the crumbs.

Regional Facilities argued then, and continues to argue, that the ratepayer does not have $70 million to upgrade Mt Smart for a private club, namely the Warriors. Nor, it says, can the city sustain three footy stadiums. After two years of public and private bickering the strategy has hit an impasse, largely, it appears, because of Eden Park's reluctance to reduce its costs and be part of a shared management structure.

Out of the blue, the council's main facilities body has ditched Eden Park, owned and operated by an independent trust, and brought North Harbour into play as the home for the Warriors after 2018.

Never mind an earlier assessment of North Harbour being a "cultural barrier to those living south of the harbour bridge".

Once again the latest strategy places the interests of the cash-strapped council, that is the ratepayer, ahead of the sporting codes and fans.

That is not to say there are no positives. There are. A $14.5 million cricket oval with grassed embankments at Western Springs has the ring of the Basin Reserve and speedway will be free to roar its heart out in industrial Penrose.

That leaves the Warriors banished to the Outer Hebrides at Albany, albeit a more intimate stadium than Eden Park.