A group of ministers have held crisis talks to see if plans for a new Wembley Stadium can be salvaged.

The team, led by Home Secretary Jack Straw, spent over an hour discussing whether the project to build a new national stadium for England in north west London should be scrapped.

Options could include going ahead with the redevelopment, scaling down the plans or choosing an alternative site.

The inquiry team is likely to take up to six weeks to consider whether the project should receive more money.

Funding collapse

Downing Street has already criticised the Football Association over the collapse of efforts to raise the necessary funding.

The FA has admitted that it was unable to get enough support from finance houses to meet the �660m cost, and that the project would need to be underwritten by the government to proceed.

Wembley National Stadium Limited, an FA subsidiary placed in charge of the project, has already received �120m in lottery funding.

But the FA refused to meet the funding shortfall.

The Conservatives have demanded the resignation of Culture Secretary Chris Smith over the collapse of the project, calling it a "humiliating fiasco".

Shadow culture secretary Peter Ainsworth accused Mr Smith of trying to pass the blame for the failure in a "futile and cowardly way".

Mr Smith has said Wembley was still the preferred site for the project.

'Choose Birmingham'

But MPs are urging him to consider other areas such as Birmingham.

Birmingham City Council has gone as far as beginning talks with the FA on using a site in the Midlands for the stadium.

On Wednesday, Conservative leader William Hague told MPs: "They (the government) scrapped the design, closed the stadium, dug up the pitch - now will they take responsibility and apologise to millions of sports fans for they mess they have created?"

Mr Smith said the FA had told him last week that it needed another �300m of public money to pay for the �650m re-development.