Nottingham Forest have taken expert advice from international architects in their bid to discover the feasibility of developing and expanding The City Ground for future generations.

And whether or not the site is utilised for World Cup use, the conclusion is that the club may have to move on to a new 'home' in order to meet the demands of meeting those requirements.

Newark-based architects Benoy have conducted a thorough study of the options available to the club and Christopher Stammers, a senior associate director with the firm, reveals that there is simply no genuine potential to develop the current City Ground.

He said today: "It would certainly not be possible to turn The City Ground into a stadium capable of hosting the World Cup, which is the subject currently under discussion.

"But, more significantly perhaps for Forest supporters, there is really insufficient space and scope within the existing site to provide the club with a stadium that will meet future needs.

"I can understand the romance and nostalgia of Forest fans wanting to stay at The City Ground - after all it has been Forest's home for many years.

"But it really is a matter of practicalities of space and operation. You could upgrade the existing facilities and clearly the first area that would be looked at is the Main Stand but any new development would have to satisfy regulations that are in place now - not when it was originally built.

"In replacing the spectator seating areas in the current stadium to modern space standards we would, for example, need an extra 26 per cent of space just to accommodate the existing number of seats - that is before considering any expansion.

"It would probably be possible to increase the capacity up to 35,000 by rebuilding the Main Stand but it would be a compromised development with poor access and put enormous pressure on what is already an awkward and constrained site. It might not be even possible to get a ground safety certificate for such an expansion.

"The scale of any new building would be such that it would be taller than the nearby Rushcliffe Borough Council offices and that would present huge legal and planning issues. It is blatantly obvious that the stadium has outgrown its surroundings.

"Existing houses, boat clubs and businesses would have to be taken out and you have to question whether that is really appropriate in planning terms.

"Stadiums have to deal with the safety and movement of large groups of people and behind that there are many other operational and access issues that come into the equation. The more the ground expands the more pressure is exerted on each individual function."

These are Benoy's findings for meeting Forest's future needs but the World Cup demands would virtually rule out The City Ground as a potential venue should Nottingham be successful in securing a place in England's 2018 bid.

Chris added: "There are many issues over the ability to cope with the World Cup overlay - such as VIP hosting, media facilities, advertising provision, camera and interview positions, hospitality areas, satellite compounds, broadcasting areas and a whole host of peripheral facilities that would get bolted on in order to meet FIFA's exacting requirements.

"But a fundamental issue is that the pitch itself is just not big enough to meet requirements. It's considerably smaller than it has to be and the area around the pitch - before you reach the stands - would also have to be so much greater than it is at the moment. It would almost be like the stadium eating itself away from the inside.

"We could do an academic exercise to produce a drawing of a stadium that would be compliant to World Cup requirements but we would end up spreading out to areas around the ground where we simply could not go.

"It's realistic to suggest that you would almost be on Radcliffe Road and London Road and we all know that is just not possible.

"There would have to be further land acquisition, it would impinge on residential areas, take out the boat house areas beside the Trent and at the end of it all there would still be massive issues to deal with in relation to the properties that remained.

"The cost of building a stadium would be in the region of £75-80 million but that would not include the purchase of land and other issues needed to complete the project.

"All along you have a general principle of trying to cram in a massively enlarged facility into a tight site with poor access. It's an interesting puzzle but one that would be almost impossible to solve given the site constraints."