While buzz­ing around Cour­tenay Place recently, I noticed that the Sports Café was closed for renov­a­tions. A sign said some­thing like “Don’t worry” (and I did­n’t) “we’ll be back with a new bar soon”. My anten­nae perked up at that: could this prom­in­ent corner soon be home to some­thing new, some­thing shiny, some­thing (not to put too fine a point on it) that’s not the Sports Café?

Then I spot­ted an email address on the sign, one that ended in “saints.co.nz”. That’s the web­site for the loc­al Saints bas­ket­ball team, so some sort of sports-related bar seemed likely. What’s more, the Saints are offi­cially “The Cen­tury City Saints”, since they are sponsored by Cen­tury City Devel­op­ments. That com­pany is owned by a cer­tain Mr Serepisos, who also hap­pens to have owned the first bar on this site: and what a many-splend­oured thing Ecstasy Plus was, back when I was just a larva.

So, gentle read­ers, what do you know about this place? Will it be a bas­ket­ball-themed bar? A return to the glitzarama of the early 90s? Or some unholy com­bin­a­tion of the two?