They think it’s all over

Wembley Stadium has been the setting for many of the greatest and most exciting moments in sport and music history. Who can forget Geoff Hurst’s famous hat-trick of ’66 or even the first Live Aid concert?

In 2002, work began on rebuilding the famous stadium at a cost of £757m – construction costs make up more than half that figure. When complete, it will be three times bigger than Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium and boast a capacity of 90,000 people.

It was never going to be an easy project. But no one could have guessed that the construction process would be packed with as many thrills and spills, in fact reminiscent of any classic match held on Wembley’s hallowed turf.

There have been rumours the concrete foundations are not strong enough and landmark targets missed. Much else we know to be true: a death on site, crane drivers threatened by snipers, huge losses by main contractor Multiplex as well as the ongoing saga of whether the ground will be ready in time for next year’s FA Cup final. More on this later.

But even before anyone gets to kick a ball on the new turf – which is being grown in a secret location – Multiplex has a date it won’t want to miss. In April it takes on steel contractor Cleveland Bridge at the High Court after Cleveland had been forced to take an early shower in 2004.

With all this going on, it’s amazing that any work gets done at all. But against the backdrop of all the comings and goings has been the silent construction director for Wembley National Stadium Limited (WNSL), Mike Richardson.

Born near Sheffield, Richardson has come out of retirement twice and is a very funny and no-nonsense type of guy. He takes a great deal of pride in his work as he gives CM a tour of the stadium. In equal measures he praises good work and points out fittings that will have to be redone.

The troubleshooter and the sniper

Richardson does not look like a man who is fretting about the task ahead. “There’s no point. You get to a point in this business that if I can’t deal with it now, you’ll never deal with it. I mean if I was going to have a nervous breakdown I would have had one 10 years ago. And this isn’t the biggest job that I’ve been on.”

He’s right, he’s worked on a lot bigger projects over his 40-year career, including the Jumeirah Beach Hotel and Burj al-Arab in Dubai, an LG electronics plant in Korea and a project for the CIA, which he can’t discuss: “I could tell you, but then I would have to shoot you.” Richardson was also a successful troubleshooter and therefore knows how to rescue a construction project or business in trouble.

But this project is possibly his most high-profile yet. And just like England’s qualification for the world cup, there have been highs and lows. So what is like working with Multiplex? “Fine,” is the one-word response. CM says we have to ask and he responds: “You’re having a laugh.”

Despite never working with Multiplex before, Richardson says they are technically competent, but working in Europe has been a “learning process”, for them.

There have been problems, or challenges as he likes to call them. Some, he concedes, are true and others false. So let’s see: were crane staff in danger of being shot by snipers?

Richardson says: “Yes. That was true insofar as the letter was delivered to the Sydney office of Multiplex which essentially threatened the crane drivers and was taken extremely seriously by Multiplex.”

There’s no point fretting. If I was going to have a nervous breakdown I’d have had one 10 years ago

Mike Richardson

No site was specifically mentioned in the letter, but the threat warranted extra security and police involvement.

Next, according to some reports in the media, it’s not just the relationship with Cleveland Bridge that was shaky, so too were the foundations.

On firm ground

This is the only time Richardson gets slightly annoyed. “Absolute rubbish, absolute nonsense. I might suggest to you that people in your profession go and check their sources out first before they print nonsense. Because that was just… I don’t know where they got it from.

“We have a view that it came from somebody on the site who had nothing to do with the site technically. Absolute nonsense, it was just laughable when that came out quite frankly.”

Landmark targets are being missed? He says: “When you’ve got an 8000-unit programme you may come to a decision that something hasn’t worked that way, then it’s reprogrammed and slotted in.”

Rebuilding Wembley into a world class stadium is a massive project – second in size only to Heathrow Terminal 5. The planning process alone is huge. The current programme details 8000 separate items that need to be coordinated and the commissioning side demands a further 3000 unit programme to ensure everything finishes at the same time and place.

The challenges have been tough, and overcome. He cites the areas of “management and motivation”, as well as the technical challenges of putting up the roof and the 133m high arch. It had to be built horizontally and lifted vertically over a number of weeks, a process he says worked well.

Late challenge

What hasn’t gone so well is the ongoing publicity of when this entire project will be finished. Previously Multiplex, an Australian company was boasting that the project would be finished well before time. Richardson says the contractors believed they could hit a 32-month target if everything went well, the actual contract programme is 40 months.

So will Wembley be ready in time? He says: “On time is an interesting definition. On time either means the contract programme or with extensions of time. What they [Multiplex] are telling us is that the contract programme finishes at the end of January and they are talking about finishing now at the end of March. So there’s a little gap that one way or another has to be closed through contract negotiations.” He says talks are under way.

But it’s got to be frustrating? He concedes the news of Multiplex missing the construction deadline did not come as a bolt out of the blue. More like a dripping tap with Multiplex saying it would finish in January, then needed another few days and then weeks. “I’m not going to say ‘it’s one of those things’, but I am sure the contractor would have been delighted to finish it at the end of January,” he says.

Then came the staggering announcement that Multiplex would make a £45m loss on the project, a far cry from the £25m profit first mooted – and this is even before its big courtroom battle with Cleveland.

Every time we change our minds Multiplex has the opportunity to say that wasn’t in the original price

Mike Richardson

This news caused a furore in the media as further details revealed that the company’s founder John Roberts was underwriting £20m of the loss and shares were also suspended. Multiplex was fast becoming the David Beckham of construction. Like David, the contractor is renowned for its skills and technical ability. But as Beckham found out after he was sent off against Argentina in the 1998 World Cup: make a mistake and you will be vilified.

Critics were happy to “show their studs” to Multiplex. One publication dubbed Multiplex the “Millwall” of construction – the south London team everyone hates – and an editorial in Building magazine called the saga just another story of trophy projects where “risk often outstrips the reward. UK contractors could see that; Multiplex, looking for a dramatic entrance into the UK market, rushed in where they feared to tread.”

The contractor’s downturn in fortunes centres on its relationship with Cleveland Bridge, which was originally appointed to provide steel and erect the arch. It left the site in 2004 and was replaced by Dutch firm Hollandia. So far Cleveland has been awarded more than £4m from adjudications. In April, both sides will clash in the high court. So what’s Richardson’s take on it?

He says: “That was a commercial decision by Multiplex who for their own reasons felt that Cleveland Bridge were not the company to finish this project on time. So they took the decision at that time, to bring someone else in and that was a commercial decision that they took.”

Did he agree with that decision? “I don’t think it’s for me to agree or disagree, it’s how they felt that they could complete the job. As you know Cleveland and Multiplex are in external discussions on how they are going to solve this. But one might say, might say. it was a brave decision to do that.”

More than a stadium

“We cannot tell them how to build a job or who to use. They’ve got a fixed price for this job and therefore generally speaking – as a matter of courtesy they have to let us know who they are using – that’s their business.”

You don’t get as far as Richardson has without being canny about risk. He says: “We are not a risk transfer organisation. Every time we change our minds they have the opportunity to say that wasn’t in our original price. So the trick is not to change your mind too often.”

Wembley is no longer just about football. It wants to attract the biggest bands, corporate events and parties. Its huge budget reflects this commercial decision. Therefore, it has to find ways to make money. For example, it has already launched Club Wembley, which guarantees seats, food and entrance to all the biggest events for the next 10 years.

Seats are selling fast and looking around Wembley you can see why. The stadium already has the “wow” factor and it’s not even complete.

Richardson has pushed for quality fittings throughout and got them. The retractable roof is coming along nicely and a sea of red seats are already filling the ground. This does not look or feel like a project in crisis. What is evident is that there are hundreds of people working hard to meet the nation’s expectations of a quality ground.

Richardson insists that the end product will be world class. And as for Multiplex – well, if Beckham can turn from a national hate figure to a global icon, there’s hope for it too.