Portsmouth to spend £26m on Fratton Park redevelopment

Portsmouth have finalised the contracts for a £26m redevelopment of Fratton Park. The south-coast club, who will play in the Premiership next season after winning the First Division championship, have confirmed details of the project with Barr, the Scottish construction firm.

Portsmouth envisage the redevelopment being carried out in two stages, the first increasing capacity by nearly 10,000 to 28,000 and the second raising capacity to 36,000.

Pompey's chairman, Milan Mandaric, said: "There is still one hitch to be resolved with a small piece of land required, but if we can acquire the same good will from this party as we have had from every other who has been working with us, there will be no obstacles and thousands of people will benefit as will the local economy.

"We will now enter an intensive period of liaising with the various groups who will turn words into bricks and mortar," he added. A planning application is expected to be submitted during the summer, with Government guidelines meaning that the local authority must make a ruling within an eight-week period.

The Premiership title race may be over but Portsmouth's local rivals, Southampton, will not be struggling for motivation in tonight's dress rehearsal for the FA Cup final, against Arsenal at Highbury.

The Saints have reached the Cup final for only the second time in the club's history but have suffered a dip in their league form since beating First Division Watford in the semi-finals at Villa Park last month, winning just one of their last seven games.

Arsenal will be smarting after Sunday's 3-2 home defeat to Leeds United handed the championship to Manchester United. But the Southampton striker Brett Ormerod is adamant that he and his team-mates still want to finish as high as possible in the Premiership despite already being guaranteed a place in Europe next season after beating Watford.

Ormerod said: "I don't think it's difficult to motivate yourself for the League.

"We all know that the table tells how good a season you've had – we're in Europe, we've reached the FA Cup final and now we want to finish as high as we can.

"It doesn't matter when we play Arsenal. We know that we're always assured a tough game against them and it will no different this week.

"Obviously people will be looking at this game for clues to the Cup final but we take one game at a time here and once the League fixtures are out of the way then we can look at the Cup final.

"We know that almost the whole planet watches that game and it's going to be a great day but the League is our priority at the moment."

Ormerod is expected to partner Southampton's leading scorer James Beattie in attack at Highbury as the new England international continues his quest to win this season's Golden Boot competition. Beattie has hit 23 Premiership goals so far, the same as Arsenal's Thierry Henry, but one behind Ruud van Nistelrooy of Manchester United.

The Southampton manager Gordon Strachan is expected to rest several of his established first-team players with his side facing two games in four days before preparations can start for next week's final.

Chris Marsden is missing as he nurses a knee injury which he suffered in last weekend's goalless draw against Bolton Wanderers. The England Under-21 captain David Prutton will take his place in the starting line-up while the Norwegian defender Claus Lundekvam is fit again after recovering from an ankle problem.