Athletics at Wembley given seal of approval

Sport England gave its blessing yesterday to the plan to have an athletics track at the mooted new national stadium at Wembley.

The original design had included the capacity for installing a removable platform capable of holding a running track, but concerns about time and cost saw that part of the plans removed.

That set in motion the chaotic descent into delays, near-disaster and embarrassment that has accompanied the Wembley project, leading eventually to the abandonment of plans to hold the 2005 World Athletics Championship at Picketts Lock.

With Wembley now back on track, a feasibility study by Sport England approved an athletics platform after design changes had led to reductions in cost and building time. The study concluded: "The new stadium is capable of accommodating athletics to IAAF standards for world athletics championships. The athletics design complies with the Lottery Funding Agreement, which states the stadium should accommodate football, rugby league and athletics."

The estimated cost of a steel platform is £12m and would take 11 weeks to build and six to remove. In 1999, a concrete platform, costing £18m and taking six months to build and the same to dismantle, was considered and rejected.

The new Wembley would seat 90,000, or 68,400 with the running track in place, and the study added: "Football and rugby can be played with the platform in situ, therefore with little disruption to the event calendar. The viewing sight-lines, seat comfort, access to state-of-the-art facilities will be excellent for athletics, football and rugby spectators."

It would also be possible now to make Wembley the centre-piece of any Olympic bid, though the British Olympic Association would prefer to make east London the focus of any such bid.

The approval comes as a welcome vote of confidence as the Football Association seeks to seal a deal to finance the £715m project. The FA is understood to be on the verge of sealing an agreement with the German bank Westdeutsche Landesbank for funding of around £400m, and have asked for more time to secure the funding.

The Culture, Media and Sport Secretary Tessa Jowell agreed to the delay, telling the House of Commons the FA was "closer than ever before to making Wembley the home of English football again".