'It'll be the greatest music arena ever built': Manchester's Co-op Live boss gives exciting update on £365m venue - and how Harry Styles and Bruce Springsteen helped

The boss of east Manchester’s new £365 million arena says it will become one of the busiest and most important music venues in the world on the day it opens.

Co-op Live, currently under construction next to the Etihad Stadium in east Manchester, is on track to be completed and host its first events in December next year.

In an exclusive interview with the Manchester Evening News, Tim Leiweke, CEO of Oak View Group, the American firm behind the project, said they had already “locked down” some artists for the first flurry of gigs.

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And he revealed how the venue on the banks of the Ashton Canal, which he says was inspired by a Bruce Springsteen remark and which Harry Styles helped create, will have 32 bars, restaurants and clubs, but will be a “big sweaty hall” inside.

Speaking from the Co-op Live’s swanky offices in the Northern Quarter, Tim, 65 said: “You’ll be hearing artists and events announced soon. We have some things already locked down. We have some big things locked down.”

On the possibility of heartthrob Harry, who is a “passionate” investor in the project, opening the venue himself, Tim said: “It’s his choice, as to what he wants to do, but my guess is in somewhere in the first six months of the building you are going to see a large Harry presence and I think he’s going to want to do something spectacular as this is hometown.

“One thing I absolutely guarantee you is it will be one of the three or four busiest arenas in the world on day one. Right off the bat.

“And I’m talking the Garden, Forum, O2, Co-op Live. Those four buildings will be the four most important music buildings in the world.

"Manchester deserves one of the