Rovers have announced they won’t pursue their Brockhall training ground proposals, following the public consultation period.

The club had outlined their intentions to sell the Senior Training Centre land, next to The Avenue Hotel in Old Langho, to finance an all-in-one training facility where their Academy base is in Brockhall Village.

Screening opinion applications were lodged with Ribble Valley Borough Council in February before a public consultation period took place from March 11-19.

The plans, which would have seen up to 170 homes built on the land of the STC, faced opposition from supporters as well as residents who formed an action group in a bid to block the plans.

However, Rovers have now revealed they have shelved those plans, and will now explore other options.

A club statement said: “The club identified an opportunity to integrate our Academy and Senior Training Centre facilities and therefore wanted to test this possible concept based on the principle of seeking approval to build new homes on the STC site to cross-finance a new state-of-the-art training centre, to be built at the Academy base.

“As part of the planning process, we ran a comprehensive public consultation to explore the views of the supporters and local residents about the initial proposals and to understand more about what matters to our fanbase and the community in Brockhall and Old Langho. 

“Having listened to and reviewed the feedback, we have made the decision not to progress with submitting the proposals in their current form as part of a planning application.

“Our aim from the outset has been to build a stronger and more sustainable future for the club, centred around modern, integrated training facilities and a more holistic approach to coaching and player development.

“We firmly believe that a fully integrated football model built around our Category One Academy status would provide the club with the best possible platform for future success and we will be considering other options moving forward in order to achieve that.”

In a statement released to the Lancashire Telegraph following the public consultation, Rovers said they had received feedback from the parish council, local councillors, supporters and residents which would be reviewed with their planning and design teams, before outlining their next steps.

The first stages of the applications, which were inextricably linked, saw the need to ascertain whether an Environment Impact Assessment would be required, the council revealing last month that wouldn’t be the case.

Rovers had also revealed there weren’t any covenants on the STC land that would have prevented any sale for housing development, and it was expected that full planning permission would then be submitted.

However, a lack of support for the proposals has seen them shelved, with Rovers now left to assess other options.

A previous consideration was to move the first-team squad back to the Academy base where they were until the switch was made by Mark Hughes during his four-year tenure between 2004 and 2008, with the STC having been opened in 2001, almost a decade on from the now Academy base.