EDINBURGH Rugby are exploring the possibility of playing Pro12 matches at Easter Road, home of Hibernian FC.
No decision has yet been taken but talks have taken place with the Scottish Championship side to discuss potential dates for "a couple of games".
It is also believed that potential problems, including the added wear and tear on the pitch and possible difficulties with fixture scheduling, have been discussed.
The former issue, the risk of substantial damage to the playing surface, was a major cause of contention when Glasgow Warriors ground-shared at Partick Thistle's Firhill home.
Edinburgh Rugby currently play their home matches at Murrayfield but rarely attract crowds in excess of 4,000 to the 68,000-capacity national stadium.
Scottish Rugby chief executive Mark Dodson admitted that playing a few games at Easter Road on a trial basis would allow Edinburgh Rugby to determine if the football ground, which holds just over 20,000, would be a more suitable long-term home.
He said: "Our hope would be that we can have a couple of games as a test with a view to moving there.
"We're closer to that than we have been for a while."
Dodson revealed that Edinburgh hope to have an agreement thrashed out in time for the coming campaign, which would see Edinburgh playing at Hibs' home ground for the first time since the 1998/99 season.
He added: "We hope we can come to some sort of arrangement for the coming season.
"We can't stay at Murrayfield for the longer term."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article