South Australia's Premier Jay Weatherill has reiterated his desire for the State to host the 2030 Commonwealth Games ©Getty Images

South Australia's Premier Jay Weatherill has reiterated his desire for the State to host the 2030 Commonwealth Games but stressed they will only launch a bid once they have fully explored the “potential costs and benefits”.

Weatherill first announced Adelaide was considering bidding for the Games in 14 years’ time back in 2013 and has confirmed they are in the process of preparing an attempt at securing the hosting rights for the event.

Speaking at a Games Appeal event, he also said that an increase in funding for the region from the Australian Government will be used to improve the area’s sporting facilities, which would then form part of the bid.

This would be spent on “eight artificial soccer pitches across the state, along with clubroom upgrades and better lighting” at a cost of AUS$10 million (£5.6 million/$7.5 million/€6.7 million).

Around AUS$2 million (£1.1 million/$1.5 million/€1.3 million) would go towards building a new International Cycling Union standard BMX track, Weatherill said.

Adelaide’s potential bid for the 2030 Games has already received the backing of businessman Robert Gerard, who urged the Government earlier this year to consider a financial report produced by David Cooke.

The Adelaide Oval would be a key venue should South Australia host the 2030 Commonwealth Games ©Getty Images
The Adelaide Oval would be a key venue should South Australia host the 2030 Commonwealth Games ©Getty Images

It revealed the overall cost of hosting the event, including the construction of infrastructure, would be around AUS$2.6 billion (£1.5 billion/$1.9 billion/€1.8 million).

This would be outweighed, however, by staging the Games generating AUS$4.4 billion (£2.5 billion/£$3.3 billion/€3 billion) in economic benefit for South Australia.

It claimed around 41,000 jobs would also be created.

“I want our State to bid for the 2030 Commonwealth Games, but I want to carefully explore both the potential costs and benefits before we make a bid,” Weatherill said.

“We have world-class stadia and other venues, and we’ve demonstrated expertise in holding major national and international sporting events.”

Australian cities Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth have previously hosted the event, and the Gold Coast is preparing to hold it in 2018, leaving South Australia as the only state on the main island not to have staged the Games.

Adelaide had been among the early contenders to be the Australian nomination for 2018 but withdrew because of budget pressures.

A decision on which city will host the 2030 Games would not be due to be made by the Commonwealth Games Federation until 2023.