Hill Dickinson Stadium: Everton open new era with 2-0 Brighton win on a sunlit Merseyside

• by Arlen Fitzpatrick
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A first day that felt bigger than a match

A football club does not move home every decade. Everton did it after 133 years. Under a warm August sun, David Moyes’ side beat Brighton & Hove Albion 2-0 to mark the first Premier League game at the new Hill Dickinson Stadium. The scoreline added three points. The day itself reset the club’s future.

The stadium sits on the lip of the River Mersey, carved into the former Bramley-Moore Dock in Vauxhall, north Liverpool. It is a clean bowl shape, built for sightlines and noise, and sized for ambition: 52,769 seats, the eighth largest in England and the eleventh largest in Britain. Everton want a ground that works every day of the week, not just on matchdays. The venue anchors a broader waterfront plan with shops, homes, gyms, and public spaces stitched around it.

The club did not rush this. After construction checks, the first ball was kicked there by the under-18s in February 2025 against Wigan’s youngsters. The men’s first team played in front of fans earlier in August in a tune‑up friendly against Roma. That stepped build-up mattered. It tested turnstiles, stewarding, catering, broadcast positions, sightlines, and the flow of thousands of people around a new waterfront site. By the time Brighton arrived, the routines felt familiar enough to be safe.

Jordan Pickford offered a window into how the players see it. He walked supporters through the new inner core: upgraded training rooms, modern treatment areas, and the kind of player spaces you expect in a top flight club chasing the next level. His message was simple—people will come because it’s new, and because it signals a new chapter for Everton. The facilities are a step up from Goodison, and the players know it.

This summer’s move followed a goodbye that fit the history. Everton signed off at Goodison Park with a 2-0 win over Southampton in May. For match-going supporters, that day was heavy: memories of first games with parents or grandparents, the tight stands, the stubborn old angles of a ground that felt like it stood up straight to the wind. Goodison was not just a place; it was a habit. Leaving that behind is not a switch you flick. It’s a process.

Sunday’s win helped. Moyes, back in the home dugout in a different era, leaned on the basics: control without panic, energy without rashness. A clean sheet kept the noise inside the bowl and flicked the story forward. Home openers often feel staged. This one felt earned.

On the pitch, the new ground has to become a fortress. Off it, the building itself is a statement. Everton have been clear about what this place is supposed to do. It raises capacity, improves comfort, and expands the space for hospitality—core things that lift matchday revenue. Naming rights with Hill Dickinson add another layer. For a club that wants to push in the Premier League and into Europe, the business case and the football case are now tied together in brick, steel, and glass.

Walk around the concourses and the logic shows. There is more room to move, better access for families, clearer signage, and modern back‑of‑house areas that keep operations out of the way of supporters. The bowl design keeps lines clean and helps the ground feel compact despite the size. The river pulls your eye whenever the walkways open up. This is not Goodison, and it never will be. That’s the point, and also the challenge.

The address matters as much as the architecture. This is north Liverpool, a part of the city that has waited while the center and the south drew more money and attention over recent decades. Professor Michael Parkinson of the University of Liverpool has pointed to that gap for years. A project like this—thousands of jobs during construction, long-term roles in operations and events, and a crowd that comes back every week—can move the dial when tied to housing, retail, and public realm work around the stadium. The promise is simple: the ground is the anchor, not the whole plan.

Not everyone is sold on the trade-offs. In July 2021, UNESCO stripped Liverpool of its World Heritage status. The organization said the waterfront developments, including the stadium, had a “completely unacceptable major adverse impact” on the site’s authenticity and integrity. Everton argued they would preserve and repair heritage assets and that sensitive design could sit alongside growth. In the end, the decision went against the city. That tension—between protecting the past and building for the future—will hang over the docks for years.

What does this new home mean for matchdays? There’s the obvious stuff—more seats, more families able to attend, and better facilities for supporters with disabilities. There’s also the less visible work: more efficient crowd management, catering that can handle a modern Premier League rush, and broadcast operations that match the scale of the league. Opening day is the first exam. The real test comes in winter when wind and rain whip off the Mersey and the calendar stacks fixtures every few days.

Goodison’s legacy is not a museum piece. It’s a living thing—values, rituals, and a specific kind of noise. Moving those to a different postcode takes time. Some supporters will love the extra elbow room. Others will miss the hard edges and the close-cut feel of the old place. Many will feel both at once. The club’s job now is to keep the core—affordable access, a strong connection to local communities, and visible player engagement—while letting the new ground shape its own traditions.

There’s also the city’s identity at stake. The waterfront is Liverpool’s calling card. For visiting fans and neutral supporters, a stadium that frames the river and the skyline becomes a destination. For residents, it needs to be more than a postcard—safe routes to and from the ground, local business opportunities that reach beyond matchdays, and spaces that stay open across the week. That’s how a stadium shifts from “venue” to “district.”

Everton and city partners pitched this as multi-use from day one. Beyond Premier League football, the plan includes major events. The stadium is marked to host matches at UEFA Euro 2028, and it’s on the slate for the 2025 Rugby League Ashes. That flexibility means different seating plans, pitch protections, and event operations, which bring their own revenue streams and challenges. It also means more people visiting the area, more often, over more months of the year.

For the club’s football strategy, the calculus is straightforward. Bigger capacity and better hospitality boost income. Naming rights add commercial stability. That, in turn, helps with squad building and the long, patient work of building competitive depth. None of that guarantees wins, but it widens what’s possible. Moyes will be judged on results. The stadium gives him a platform.

And what of the old home? Goodison Park will not simply be emptied and forgotten. The club has spoken about honoring its legacy while moving on. Supporters will want to see that show up in tangible ways—heritage projects, memorial spaces, and a continued commitment to people and programs that defined the L4 community. The goodbye in May was one moment. Keeping the promise to respect that history is the longer task.

If you’re looking for a snapshot of Everton’s week that was, it reads like a clean sequence: test events in February to learn the building; a summer friendly to make the new routines feel normal; a 2-0 win over Brighton to cut the ribbon in real competition. The pattern is deliberate: plan, test, deliver. The club will need that same method for everything that follows, from transport to pricing to balancing event demand against the needs of residents who live and work nearby.

On a practical level, the club says it has worked through detailed operations for arrivals and departures, stewarding, and emergency access. That will evolve as more games stack up and patterns become clear. Early wins in logistics matter as much as early wins in the league table. A ground becomes “home” when getting there, being there, and getting away feels natural.

What gives this stadium its edge is setting. Waterfront venues change the feel of sport. The approach to the ground, the light, the wind, and the sense of space all shape the day. Supporters will build new rituals—where to meet, which turnstiles are quickest, the point on the concourse where you first see the pitch. These habits make a building personal. The sooner they form, the sooner the place becomes Everton’s in more than name.

And yet, the counterpoint remains: a historic city lost a title it cherished. UNESCO’s decision will continue to spark arguments about how cities modernize without erasing what made them unique. For north Liverpool, the question is practical: will this project unlock jobs, transport improvements, and new homes at the speed and scale promised? For Everton, the responsibility is just as clear: keep the club rooted in its people while using the new platform to push standards.

Opening day brought a clean result and a clear message. Everton have a modern, event-ready stadium by the Mersey. The team has a stage that fits the league they want to compete in. The city has a new civic space with the power to pull people north. Now the long part begins: turning one bright afternoon in August into a hundred compelling nights and a generation’s worth of memories.

Key milestones and what comes next

Big projects make more sense when you track the steps. Everton’s path to their new home looks like this:

• July 2021: UNESCO removes Liverpool from the World Heritage list, citing waterfront developments including the stadium’s impact.
• May (previous season): Everton sign off at Goodison Park with a 2-0 win over Southampton.
• February 2025: First test event at the new ground—Everton U18s vs Wigan U18s.
• Early August 2025: First-team friendly against Roma in front of fans to tune operations.
• August 24, 2025: First Premier League match at Hill Dickinson Stadium—2-0 vs Brighton.

What stands out inside the new ground?

• Capacity: 52,769 seats, built for strong sightlines and noise retention.
• Design: a modern bowl on the Mersey, prioritizing fan circulation and clear views.
• Location: Bramley-Moore Dock in Vauxhall, tying the stadium to a wider mixed‑use plan.
• Scale: eighth largest in England, eleventh in Britain.
• Use: built for football first, but flexible enough for major events like Euro 2028 and the 2025 Rugby League Ashes.
• Commercial spine: naming rights with Hill Dickinson and expanded hospitality to lift long-term revenue.

Some questions will take time to answer. How quickly will the wider dockside development fill in around the ground? How does matchday pricing evolve as demand grows? What balance can the club strike between multi-event scheduling and protecting the pitch? Can the stadium accelerate jobs and investment in north Liverpool at the pace people expect? These are the tests that turn architecture into impact.

The first impression, though, is clear. Everton have swapped a storied, stubborn old home for a modern, waterfront arena built to carry them forward. The emotions around Goodison will never fade. They aren’t supposed to. The task now is to build new memories at the water’s edge and make a fresh place feel like it has always been theirs.