This story gets repeated often over the decades as individuals, clubs and authorities talk about building a ‘Wembley of the North’. Back on 20 June 1992 the latest version of the story was that a new stadium would be built as Manchester’s bid for the 2000 Olympics. The article claimed that work on this stadium would start whether Manchester was awarded the Games or not.
In the end Manchester was not awarded the Games but the city did stage the 2002 Commonwealth Games and a new stadium, present day Etihad, was built for that.
The article was published in a Liverpool newspaper and it’s interesting that there’s talk in this of building an arena at King’s Dock, which of course has also happened.
There are some errors in the article, for example it claims that neither City nor United had expressed an interest in moving to the stadium but City had been in discussions for several years about supporting the Olympic bids. In fact in 1989 the club had announced it was interested in a move if a stadium was ever to be planned.
Gary James' Football Archive 
Gary,
I was looking through an old magazine (Total Sport, Feb 1997), when I came across the attached article relating to the National Stadium decision.
It is interesting to see what was promised by Wembley – retractable roof, running track disappearing under seating, televisions on back of seats, retention of twin towers.
Dave.
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