Wimbledon Stadium & Plough Lane

Wimbledon F.C. played at the original Plough Lane stadium from 1912 until 1991, eighty years on one site. That ground was considered unsuitable for conversion into a modern all-seater stadium, and after 1991 the club ground-shared with Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park, meaning to move to a new all-seater ground elsewhere later. Numerous locations inside and beyond the borders of Merton were considered, none came to fruition, and in 2003 the original club controversially relocated 70 miles north to Milton Keynes and rebranded as Milton Keynes Dons.

A phoenix club, AFC Wimbledon, had been formed by supporters in 2002 after the Football Association gave Wimbledon F.C. permission to make that move. For its first eighteen years the new club played at Kingsmeadow Stadium in the neighbouring London borough of Kingston, while stating that one of its primary aims was to return to Merton, to a stadium close to what it regards as its "spiritual home" of the original Plough Lane.

The ground that resulted stands on the site of the Wimbledon Greyhound Stadium, about 200 yards further east than the one Wimbledon F.C. had used. In 2013 AFC Wimbledon announced discussions with Merton Council over a joint bid for the greyhound stadium and the land around it, with the developer Galliard Homes, covering a football ground, 600 residential properties and community facilities. The council approved the stadium plans unanimously on 10 December 2015, clearance of the site began on 16 March 2018, and the freehold passed to an AFC Wimbledon subsidiary on 24 December 2018, among transactions that also formally transferred ownership of Kingsmeadow to Chelsea.

Building proceeded with the permanent west stand first, seating 4,267, with semi-permanent stands on the other three sides bringing the initial capacity to 9,215. In 2019 it was announced that at least £2 million in crowdfunding would be needed for a scaled-down version of the original design, with a single permanent stand and an initial capacity of 9,000; by August 2019 that £2 million had been raised through Seedrs. In November 2019 it emerged that the final £11m needed to complete the ground as envisaged was not forthcoming, and the fan ownership weighed scaling the project down or taking outside investment by relinquishing ownership. Supporters instead raised the money through a bond issue that brought in over £5 million, and in May 2020 the last financing needed to sign all the construction contracts was confirmed after investment from a local businessman, Nick Robertson. The opening had been planned for the summer of 2019; it did not take place until 3 November 2020.

AFC Wimbledon's first match at the new ground, on 3 November 2020, was a 2–2 draw with Doncaster Rovers, Joe Pigott scoring the first goal at the stadium in the 18th minute. No supporters could attend, owing to the national COVID-19 restrictions in force. An NHS COVID-19 vaccination centre opened in the stadium's event space on 25 March 2021, and some of the first people vaccinated there were club supporters. The first game spectators could attend was on 18 May 2021, when 2,000 watched Wimbledon play Liverpool's under-23 side in a friendly arranged to test the ground's public safety standards; the first before a capacity crowd was a 3–3 draw with Bolton Wanderers on 14 August 2021.

In December 2020 the Dons Trust announced that it was discussing a groundshare with the rugby league side London Broncos, and a vote of the membership in March 2021 returned 91.7 per cent of those voting in favour. It turned on revised planning permission, opposed by a group of residents, but the issues were settled before the 2022 season and the Broncos played their first match at the ground against the Widnes Vikings on 30 January 2022. The stadium had been renamed the Cherry Red Records Stadium on 16 September 2021, under a further three-year deal with the label that had sponsored Kingsmeadow.

AFC Wimbledon Women played their first game there on 21 October 2021, beating Walton Casuals 7–1 in the Women's FA Cup in front of a record crowd, and on 5 March 2022 the ground staged the FA Women's Continental League Cup final between Chelsea Women and Manchester City Women. In September 2024 the River Wandle burst its banks and damaged the pitch: the EFL Cup third-round tie with Newcastle United was put back from 24 September to 1 October 2024 and moved to Newcastle's St James' Park, home fixtures against Accrington Stanley and Crewe Alexandra were rearranged, and Newcastle donated £15,000 to the appeal to repair the damage.

The record attendance at the ground, 8,737, was set on 18 April 2026 in a 3–1 League One defeat by Plymouth Argyle, and its record for a cup game, 8,595, on 6 January 2024 against Ipswich Town. On 24 May 2026 it hosted its first American football match, the London Warriors against Panthers Wrocław in the opening week of the newly formed AFLE's debut season, and ahead of the 2026–27 season it was to stage Chelsea Women's domestic cup matches and their UEFA Women's Champions League matches in the league phase. The ground is owned by AFC Wimbledon and holds planning permission to be expanded to 20,000 spectators.