Pele adds voice to Wembley campaigners

Wembley has hit back in the increasingly fraught struggle to land the new National Football Stadium with famous old ground enlisting the support of Pele, Franz Beckenbauer, Bobby Robson, Sir Geoff Hurst and Sir Henry Cooper.

Less than a week after Birmingham unveiled plans for a 85,000-capacity stadium to be built on a greenfield site, the Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, has launched a star-studded campaign to ensure the National Stadium stays on its traditional site.

Illustrious foreign names such as Beckenbauer and Pele, who never actually played at Wembley, are in favour of the disused ground being rebuilt while the former England manager Bobby Robson is adamant that the new stadium cannot be anywhere else.

"Wembley is recognised as the home of English football around the world," the Newcastle United manager said, "and I believe it should remain so in the future.

"Wembley is one of the greatest stadium names in the world along with the Maracana, Azteca, Nou Camp, and Munich's Olympic Stadium and the Stade de France. It would be a great loss to the world of football if Wembley was no longer the home of English football."

Cooper, the former British heavyweight champion, added: "Wembley is one of the greatest sporting venues in the world. For it to be consigned to the scrapheap would be a national disgrace. It should be rebuilt as the home of English football and the nation's stadium."

With the Birmingham bid boosted by a recent Football Supporters' Association survey that showed that over two-thirds of fans would prefer moving the National Stadium to the midlands, Wembley also rallied support from today's players.

The Arsenal and England defender Ashley Cole, fresh from starring in the 5-1 win over Germany in Munich, threw his weight behind the GLA campaign. "As a kid I used to dream of playing at Wembley," Cole said. "Now my dream could be taken away."

The Greater London Authority has joined with Brent Council in their bid to keep the National Stadium in their area and preserve 10,000 jobs. Announcing the results of a survey conducted by the Wembley Task Force which showed that 46 per cent of the public are in favour of Wembley, Livingstone stressed that the stars' support, "backs what the nation has already said, 'It's got to be Wembley,' and demonstrates the huge pull Wembley has throughout the world of football and how impossible it would be to replace."

Manchester United are to conduct their own investigation after the makers of a television documentary claim they were forced to pay five times the face value for two match tickets bought off the Internet. A new ITV consumer show – The Man in the Van – will reveal that companies trading on the Internet are illegally ripping off clubs and fans for tickets to Premiership matches.

As a direct result of the TV programme, United's managing director, David Gill, has pledged to stamp out ticket touts and has confirmed his club are considering introducing 'smart cards' to identify fans entering the ground.

The television presenter Jonathan Maitland explains to viewers how he bought two United tickets over the Internet for £265 for the first Premiership game of the season against Fulham. The face value of the seats in the East Stand was only £48.