Think of a number.
The cost of building the new 92,000-seater Wembley Stadium is becoming something of a sick joke, and comparisons with the ill-fated Millennium Dome are, not surprisingly, being drawn.
Latest information puts the total bill at a staggering £750m, making it arguably the most expensive sporting stadium ever to be built – anyone who has tried to buy a house in London knows how expensive it can be.
But the cost of building a new national football stadium smacks of the ridiculous.
Consider this: the City of Manchester Stadium, used to host the recent Commonwealth Games and now being converted into a 48,000-seater for Manchester City Football Club cost £110m to build, while Cardiff’s 72,000-capacity Millennium Stadium, which has substituted for Wembley since 2000, cost a measly £121m.
And speaking of cost-cutting – Sunderland FC’s 48,000-seater Stadium of Light cost a paltry £23m!
But an even more frightening scenario awaits: in October 2000, the cost of the stadium was put at £660m, in July this year it had risen to £715m.
Now it’s £750m. If politicians continue to squabble over Wembley for much longer, the prospect of the first ever £1bn football stadium does not seem like a far-fetched idea!