Following the City Council's decision yesterday to pull out of the race for a casino licence for Birmingham, both Birmingham City Football Club and the team behind the Birmingham Sports Village project are clearly disappointed.

The opportunity to regenerate an area of the inner city and at the same time, really give Birmingham the second city status it deserves within the UK, has been lost.

The benefits that the people of Birmingham would have derived from this major regeneration project were abundant.

It is illogical that a major city such as ours would not stand alone in applying for a casino licence and give the City every possible chance of winning to realise the dream of truly putting Birmingham on the map.

To, in effect, withdraw from the race and choose to back the local authority of Solihull with a joint application is without doubt, an opportunity sacrificed.

We wish the NEC the best of luck with their application and hope that they now have a strong enough regeneration case to win on a national level and compete with some major players across the UK to deliver real benefit to this region.

We are delighted that the City Council acknowledges the Sports Village concept we've pioneered and its ability to "boost Birmingham's national and international reputation" and with their promise that, in the event that the NEC wins the casino licence, the money raised will build a new stadium for Birmingham and a Birmingham Sports Village.