With the revelation that Darlington has lost its bid to host next year's Eurovision Song Contest, we take a look at where it could have been held in the town.

And there is really only one venue that was large enough to accommodate the show - the Mowden Park Arena.

The stadium is well-used to holding music concerts having hosted the likes of Blue and Olly Murs in recent years.

It is also gearing up to stage the Ibiza Live Orchestra this Friday and Simply Red the following day so staging major music events is nothing new to the stadium.

The Northern Echo: Olly Murs performing at Darlington's Mowden Park Arena in 2021 Picture: Northern EchoOlly Murs performing at Darlington's Mowden Park Arena in 2021 Picture: Northern Echo

There is a comprehensive list of requirements for venues wanting to host the Eurovision Song Contest, including an audience capacity of 10,000.

Mowden Park has seating for 25,000 and even with seats unavailable due to the staging, it would still be big enough to host the competition.

Read more: Darlington confirms it WILL bid to host the Eurovision Song Contest in 2023

Host venues must also be near to an airport due to the international nature of the contest and Mowden Park fits that bill being a mere eight miles from Teesside Airport.

Darlington also has excellent rail links being on the main London to Edinburgh line.

Other considerations include whether a host location can accommodate the tens of thousands of people who attend the event and Darlington has good provision with several large hotels including a Premier Inn, Travelodge, Mercure and Blackwell Grange.

Host venues must also have adequate provision for the competitors' wardrobes, changing facilities and press facilities with phone and broadband connection for 1,500 people, with minimum 900 at once.

These requirements would almost certainly rule out the contest being held somewhere like South Park as the cost of creating such extensive facilities outdoors on a temporary basis would be huge.

It also rules out venues such as the Hippodrome and Majestic theatres are they are far too small to accommodate the show.

The Northern Echo: Darlington has multiple hotels including the Premier Inn Picture: GoogleDarlington has multiple hotels including the Premier Inn Picture: Google

The shortlist of potential locations to host the locations was revealed on BBC Radio 2 on Friday which saw Newcastle making the cut.

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