The Wembley Stadium debacle is heading for the law courts after the builders’ refusal to pay penalty clauses for yet another delay to the £757m (€1.1m) project.

The Football Association has confirmed the first match at the new Wembley stadium will not take place until 2007.

Football Association chief executive Brian Barwick today released the following statement regarding this year’s FA Cup Final:

THE chances of this year’s FA Cup final being held at the new Wembley stadium have receded further with builders Multiplex admitting there is only a 70% chance of construction work being finished on time.

Sport England were today branded ‘‘slack, slovenly and supine’’ in the way it distributed £120m of lottery funding towards the Wembley National Stadium Project.

Wembley Stadium could be rebuilt with a removable athletics track - three years after the idea was deemed unworkable.

The strife-torn Wembley national stadium project lurched into new controversy today when a bitterly-angry Ken Bates quit as vice-chairman and aimed a volley of parting shots at the Football Association, Sports Minister Kate Hoey and former colleagues.