Martin joined London Irish as chief executive in September 2009

London Irish chief executive Andy Martin is hopeful the club's planning application to build new facilities at Hazelwood will be successful.

The Exiles planning application will re-commence on 7 June, and is expected to last for two weeks.

Martin told BBC Berkshire: "It's pretty intensive and a lot of work is going on at the moment.

"Hazelwood becomes very important for us as it gives us a business to build and gives us something to work with."

The club are hoping to relocate from their Sunbury base and move to Hazelwood Golf Course, where they will build 17 training pitches for professional use and for the local community.

The Exiles' chief executive is confident they addressed the obstacles that stopped their initial application from being granted.

"We think we've crossed off a fair amount of the reasons for refusal so we're down to two or three fundamental planning law issues.

"We have a strong team and they've given us the advice that we have a very strong case," he added.

Martin believes the application will be of benefit to the local community.

"It gives us a facility we would be proud of. It will help us with retention and development of players and people will be attracted to it but then it helps us to be open for the rest of the year to the community," he said.

"We've all sorts of things that we can make available to the local community which is very much part of the case we are making."

But should the application fail the club have braced themselves for alternative arrangements.

"We're doing all the consequential planning. If we didn't get this we've got to look at a number of scenarios," Martin continued.

"We're just hoping it doesn't come to that but clearly we're not going to go into this with a 'do or die' situation.

"The club is very, very important to the investors and to the supporters so it's paramount to us all to get that right."

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