League One football grounds ranked: Adrian Durham’s definitive list after completing the 92 challenge

League One is a division talkSPORT’s Adrian Durham knows well – and he also knows the grounds in it like the back of his hand.

After spending his life supporting Peterborough and then becoming a football reporter, Durham has visited every single third tier stadium on his route to completing the 92.

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talkSPORT’s Game Day host recently finished visiting every English football league club in the country, with a visit to Fleetwood in League Two last month giving him the full house.

But after his many trips around the lower leagues, which grounds does he rate the most?

We challenged Durham to give us his top 10 football grounds in the 92, with the top choice stunning plenty of supporters across the country.

This time around, though, we’re challenging him to rank each of the top four tiers’ stadiums.

It’s likely his takes will be personal after visiting a majority with the Posh.

So, don’t come shouting at us if your club is lower than you’d like! It’s all subjective.

League One might be the third tier of the English game, but there’s plenty of ex-Premier League clubs, and their grounds, that have found themselves down here.

From recently relegated and NFL legend Tom Brady-backed Birmingham City, to newcomers Wrexham and Stockport, League One has a brilliant range of grounds for the travelling fan to tick off.

But which ones are the best? And whose stadiums have left Durham feeling unimpressed?

Over to you, Adrian!

Read Adrian Durham’s complete Championship and League Two rankings

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24. The Select Car Leasing Stadium (Reading)

Reading have gone bottom of the table, it’s soporific. It’s just so dull and so boring. It will send you to sleep. There’s nothing there to love. I don’t even see it as a football stadium. I know it is but I’ve seen so many other sports there.

I can’t be doing with it really. I don’t love it at all. And their old ground, Elm Park, was brilliant. That was tight.

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23. Memorial Stadium (Bristol Rovers)

Bristol Rovers is simply not a football ground. That’s the truth, it’s a rugby ground.

I find it impossible to love.

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22. The Brick Community Stadium (Wigan Athletic)

I’ve been a couple of times and I’ve just found it hard to warm to it. Whether it’s because the rugby league team play there as well and maybe I see it as more of a rugby town than a football town I don’t know, that might be it.

But I just find it a bit dark and soulless. It’s always empty as well.

21. Sixfields (Northampton Town)

It’s a fairly modern ground but it’s like a kit they’ve put together. It feels like it could fall down any second.

It feels very temporary.

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20. Oakwell Stadium (Barnsley)

Old can be good, but this isn’t a good. This is not a good ground. It might still be there but they had a men’s toilets with no roof on.

For a club that spent quite a bit of time in the Championship, had a season in the Premier League, you would have thought that by now they’d have spent money to properly update the ground.

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19. Toughsheet Community Stadium (Bolton Wanderers)

I’ve been here twice, and this ground felt like it could be anywhere. The times I’ve been, the atmosphere was nothing special. I went when they beat Sunderland 6-0, half the away end left at half time because they were so bad.

What sticks in my head more is the fact the first time I went, opening day of the season, I had no takeaway of a good memory of it really.

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18. New Meadow (Shrewsbury Town)

I went to Shrewsbury as a kid and I used to go to the old ground a lot and I loved it, I really loved it. It was right next to the river and I just really enjoyed going there, so it was a bit sad for me when they left.

There’s a redeeming feature in that their ultras never stop.
The last time I went there, they were 1-0 down to Forest Green and it got to injury time and Shrewsbury scored two goals. Those ultras just kept going and going.

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17. Broadfield Stadium (Crawley Town)

Crawley is small and unremarkable, which is harsh but true.

It was opened in 1997. Not a whole load to say on this one.

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16. Lamex Stadium (Stevenage)

So I covered Stevenage for radio and newspaper and I wrote something in the paper which was true, but they didn’t like it so they banned me. It wasn’t because I was a hooligan or anything!

But it’s nothing special, the ground is nothing special. It just is what it is, it’s just a slightly below average small football ground.

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15. New York Stadium (Rotherham)

The old ground was excellent, quite scary on a midweek evening. That was some experience. It’s a decent new ground actually, it’s okay. But again, the atmosphere didn’t strike me as being particularly brilliant.

The stadium in terms of architecture, it’s not particularly brilliant. There’s nothing really special about it but it’s okay, it’s decent enough.

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14. St Andrew’s (Birmingham City)

Birmingham spent an eye-watering amount on transfers, but they’re not top of my stadium rankings. They are improving it. I went this season and it did look a little bit better and they’ve got plans to move away.

But this stadium, honestly, has been a joke for a long, long time. It’s been neglected I would say for far too long so it’s hard to love it. I don’t even think their fans love it really because it’s just been so badly looked after, but gradually things are improving with it.

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13. The Racecourse (Wrexham)

Another one that’s been neglected and they are starting to kind of rebuild it if you like. I think it could be a really special ground when they’ve rebuilt it.

It used to host Wales games but it couldn’t do that now. So when they finish doing it up, I think the aim is for it to host internationals and that would be something special. It could be really good.

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12. John Smith’s Stadium (Huddersfield Town)

The architecture of it is really good. The lights on it are really impressive, they’re kind of unique.

And also, from the main stand where we work from, you can see trees above the stand opposite and it’s just quite a beautiful view. I like it a lot.

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11. Abbey Stadium (Cambridge United)

I initially just thought well they’re Posh’s rivals so I’ll stick them down the bottom, but actually, I know it’s quite painful, but I worked there a lot because I used to be a Cambridge United reporter when I first started my career.

When you cover a club, you speak to fans, speak to players and managers and in the job you can become attached to a football club. Now I’m not saying I went that far with Cambridge United but there’s a fondness there because it helped shape part of my life and my career.

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10. St James Park (Exeter City)

I haven’t been there for years. I went there once in the 1990s and I haven’t been back since.

I’ve been told it’s been completely redone but my memory of it is that it was okay, it was small, it was perfectly acceptable. But we won the FA Cup tie 1-0, so I love it.

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9. Field Mill (Mansfield Town)

Another one I’ve not been to for years. It’s shaped by the positive memory I have from going there. We won 1-0 on the last day of the season in the 80s and I was a teenage boy at the time so that stuck in my head a lot.

I think the ground has changed significantly since that.

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8. Pirelli Stadium (Burton Albion)

The architecture would look good in non-league, it looks okay in League One, bearing in mind their lack of fan base. It even held its own as a small ground in the Championship.

I feel like they’ve done quite well with the architecture of the stadium. It is small but there’s things about it that I do appreciate.

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7. Brisbane Road (Leyton Orient)

It’s a good atmosphere at Orient isn’t it? It’s just one of those London grounds that I love, in the middle of East London. It’s got heart there.

I don’t like the flats that have been built on the corner and all that but generally I love the old-school nature of it and the fact it’s right in the heart of east London.

6. Adams Park (Wycombe Wanderers)

We never win there but it’s just one of those places, it’s lovely.

It’s nice and leafy and there’s lots of green, you can’t help but like it. I don’t know, I shouldn’t like it but I do.

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5. LNER Stadium (Lincoln City)

Lincoln is surprisingly good! There’s a lovely view of the cathedral at night which is a bit special.

I thought the atmosphere was good. People will be surprised it’s this high but I like it a lot.

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4. Edgeley Park (Stockport County)

I like it because it’s a bit old-school. You turn a corner and you look at it, and the way the Stockport County sign is, it’s really old-school, 60s, 70s. They’ve looked after the ground quite well.

They used to have a lot of games on Friday nights and I can remember being in the away end on a Friday night and winning there. So again, it’s personal memories.

3. Bloomfield Road (Blackpool)

It’s Blackpool, isn’t it? It’s like going on a stag do, it’s brilliant. It’s near the sea, it’s just great.

Actually when you think about Blackpool’s football history, you’ve got to appreciate that. It’s worthy of a high spot.

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2. The Valley (Charlton Athletic)

I went to The Valley when it was shut in the early 90s. I was at college in London training to be a journalist and one of our lecturers lived around the corner from the ground. So she said come and look, it was all overgrown. I went to look at it and I thought wow, they’re never getting back in there. It looks such a state. I was blown away by the ground. It looked fantastic and I thought what a shame.

Of course, then you find out they’re redoing it and then they’re back in. So the first time I went there when there was a game I really felt that change from what I’d seen when it was all run down and overgrown with weeds. I’ve appreciated that every time I’ve been to a game there.

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1. London Road (Peterborough United)

It really wouldn’t get in many people’s top 92 would it? I mean, it’s not great. But it’s where I fell in love with football. So it’s not a great stadium, but it is a special one to me. 

And where you are at the away end, the stand to the left which is a two-tier, that used to be an open terrace. That’s where I grew up watching football. It was called the Glebe, I used to stand there and get rained on in division four. That was my football education.

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