STEPHEN ROBERTS on how Scunthorpe United should take the credit – or blame – for starting the surge for new football stadiums

In its infancy: Glanford Park in 1988

IT WAS 1988 – the year when England had a stinker in the European Championships in West Germany, Liverpool won Division One and Wimbledon’s Crazy Gang claimed the FA Cup.
But away from the big headlines, Scunthorpe United (the ‘Iron’, after the biggest iron-ore field in Europe) moved into their new £2.5m Glanford Park ground.

This was the first new purpose-built Football League g...