I don´t know how many of you agree but one arena that seems to be "forgotten" is the versatile facility in Paris. Does anyone have interior pictures of the arena and capacity figures.

i was so excited when i saw the topic
because of seeing some pics :(

yeah,
we want to see some pics

For years ligue 1 has been the weakest of the superleagues of western europe but things may be about to change.First of all interest in the national team has lessened so many french football fans are diverting their attention back to domestic matters boosting attendances. Secondly the emergence of Lyon as the dominant force in France was expected to grind to a halt with the appointment of gerard houllier but in truth they have only flourished even more selling out over 85% of their home games this season. As a bonus another french side who have won many admirers and as a result built up a huge amount of support is lille. They are building themselves a new groynd at the moment so if anyone has any information on that post it on this thread.Finally the record new TV deal agreed to start this season has meant double the funds for french clubs, yet still although to a lesser extent then last year they are stuck in the habit of selling players eg Essien ,Evra etc. I hope that this new deal can help raise the profile of the league as less french players will move abroad due to clubs not being run on the tight budgets of previous seasons.This should attract more fans to games and in the future we could for the first time since Marseille see french clubs being contenders for the champions league.They have the potential apart from modern giants Lyon and Lille as well as past masters Marseille and St Etienne there is the glamour clubs of the north and south Paris SG and Bordeaux.
But can this really happen or is french football doomed to mediocrity for eternity?

The only major club in France's second or third city.

After four years of complete domination in France.

When they are storming away with this year's title.

When stadium capacity is only about 40,000.

Yet Lyon are only selling out 85% of home games?

Not very impressive, you have to say.

So what's the size of this new TV deal? How does it compare with England?

I really can't see French football (other than Lyon) consistently challenging Europe's big three leagues any time in the near future.

This is taken from deloitte.com
"The German Bundesliga and French Ligue 1 experienced a decrease in revenue in 2003/04 to €1,058m and €655m respectively, a 5% drop in each case, the result of declining broadcast revenues. Italian Serie A revenues were static for the third successive year with revenues totalling €1,153m.
The French will reverse this trend soon. The Ligue 1 clubs’ revenues will be boosted significantly from 2005/06 when a €600m a season domestic television rights deal with Pay-TV broadcaster Canal Plus commences. The c.50% increase on current deals, will put it on a par with the English Premiership as the most lucrative domestic football league broadcast contract in the world"


So in theory all french clubs will need to do is work on improving their average gates and they will perhaps with a little more success and worldwide marketing be on a par with english clubs financially

This is taken from deloitte.com
"The German Bundesliga and French Ligue 1 experienced a decrease in revenue in 2003/04 to €1,058m and €655m respectively, a 5% drop in each case, the result of declining broadcast revenues. Italian Serie A revenues were static for the third successive year with revenues totalling €1,153m.
The French will reverse this trend soon. The Ligue 1 clubs’ revenues will be boosted significantly from 2005/06 when a €600m a season domestic television rights deal with Pay-TV broadcaster Canal Plus commences. The c.50% increase on current deals, will put it on a par with the English Premiership as the most lucrative domestic football league broadcast contract in the world"


So in theory all french clubs will need to do is work on improving their average gates and they will perhaps with a little more success and worldwide marketing be on a par with english clubs financially

They'll need much more than just this improved TV deal and higher attendances, IMO. English clubs can and do charge far higher ticket prices, have (or will soon have) bigger stadiums and have far more developed commercial and merchandising operations than French clubs. Football will never be remotely as popular in France as it is in England so I can't see how French clubs, in general, will bridge the gap.

Germany, on the other hand, could be the big movers over the next ten years. Football is very popular there. They have big, modern stadia. All they would need to make serious advances would be to charge higher ticket prices (they're currently very cheap) and to negotiate a better TV deal. If the Championnat can win such a lucrative TV deal, then surely the Bundesliga can too?

The only major club in France's second or third city.

After four years of complete domination in France.

When they are storming away with this year's title.

When stadium capacity is only about 40,000.

Yet Lyon are only selling out 85% of home games?

Not very impressive, you have to say.

So what's the size of this new TV deal? How does it compare with England?

I really can't see French football (other than Lyon) consistently challenging Europe's big three leagues any time in the near future.


false , the average attendance is 39000 this season and the number of seats is also limited below the 100% , the club could fill 60000 or 65000 seats every week that's why aulas wants ( and will under 5 years ) to build a new stadium :) .

false , the average attendance is 39000 this season and the number of seats is also limited below the 100% , the club could fill 60000 or 65000 seats every week that's why aulas wants ( and will under 5 years ) to build a new stadium :) .

I've also noticed French teams doing better in Europe in recent years. I'm not sure if Lyon could get 60000 a week though, as their average is 2000 below their biggest crowd of the season. Lens have got great crowds when you consider how tiny Lens is.

http://www.european-football-statistics.co.uk/attn/current/avefra.htm

wrong , they have between 25 and 30000 waiting crowd so the stadium will be full of 60000 people .

Can someone remind me the consolidated loss of English clubs? :hilarious

The stronger European leagues are the better as far as I am concerned, good news for France. The better the European leagues are the better the Champions League is (hopefully) so more entertainment, even if that doesn't include English clubs. :)

The Premiership ticket pricing is absurd! way overpriced, bloated and unsustainable. £35 minimum to see an Arsenal game; and even in the lower leagues, I went to watch Barnet play this season (league2 - thats the old division4) and it cost £17 to sit in a tin shed! thats what 25 euros?....Jesus!

I don't really care much for how successfull a league is financially...no change that, yes I do! I hope that the top 20 clubs in that stupid deloitte list get forced to start distributing their wealth around a bit more to fund grass roots so we don't get to the state that Serie A has found itself in. Theres also something wrong when the weekly wage of a football player is more than the entire yearly earnings of a whole terrace.

I like like the French and Dutch leagues because they aren't swimming in odious amounts of wealth and yet still produce strong teams, PSV, Lyon and Monaco

For the record only Lyon has a concrete project right now for a big new stadium 55000+seats... it will pretty much be an emirate stadiums look a like,as JM Aulas will visit the new Wembley and the new Arsenal facility, and will cost around 115M euros...it would include all the classics,restaurant, hotel, conference center, megastore... Bad point it will not be in downtown Lyon but in the suburbs and it will in one way be a big premiere as funds will come from an americon pension found called Apollo.

Marseille has also an idea to get the Velodrome at 80000+ seats and Robert Louis Dreyfus - OM President - is looking for funds right now...

As for Lille, well they should have had their new stadium by now... But the truth is there's nothing going on. Not even an architect rendering to be found. The city can't get the current project to be build and they need to find a new place for an all new facility with funds to be provided by both the city and private invastors...However the stadium supposed to get built was only a 35000 seats... Just like the new stade du Ray in Nice is going to be a nice but stupidly small 32000 seats...

As being the weakest superleague in Europe it's absolutely true however has it was mentioned the new tv deal is kinda sweet... You should not forget either that french teams can't run deficit the way most italian, spanish, and english teams are doing.

All that being said is this championship on the rise yes? but when mentioning that except for 2 stadiums in Auxerre 20000+ and that piece of crap in Ajaccio 80000+ (I am not being mean I am just sincere and honest) no team owns his stadiums... You can understand the gap between Ligue 1 and Premiership. I don't even want to get into the merchandising problem...

Not to forget one last thing this championship is boring to death when Lyon is not playing...

So on the rise yes surely but slowly.

wrong , they have between 25 and 30000 waiting crowd so the stadium will be full of 60000 people .

Well, to be honest, given the circumstances (Lyon's dominance of French football, their great performances in the Champions' League and the fact that Lyon is a huge city with only one major football club), then Lyon really ought to be able to attract crowds of 60,000 every week.

But the fact remains that Lyon's highest attendance this season (a sell out, I presume) was just over 40,000. Yet their average attendance this season is only just over 38,000 (meaning that some games must have attracted less than 38,000). Last season, average attendances were 37,500. The season before that, they were 36,000. In 2001-02, they were 34,000.

So if Lyon can't sell out a 40,000 stadium every week when they have their best ever team winning title after title, then there's nothing to suggest that they could sell out a 60,000 stadium every week. Especially if the team starts performing poorly.

Can someone remind me the consolidated loss of English clubs? :hilarious

Other than Chelsea, very few Premiership clubs report big losses these days. They learnt the lessons of Leeds. And Chelsea, as the whole world knows, are a law unto themselves. They can absorb a £140 million loss as easily as a sheet of kitchen towell can absorb a droplet of water.

Well, to be honest, given the circumstances (Lyon's dominance of French football, their great performances in the Champions' League and the fact that Lyon is a huge city with only one major football club), then Lyon really ought to be able to attract crowds of 60,000 every week.

But the fact remains that Lyon's highest attendance this season (a sell out, I presume) was just over 40,000. Yet their average attendance this season is only just over 38,000 (meaning that some games must have attracted less than 38,000). Last season, average attendances were 37,500. The season before that, they were 36,000. In 2001-02, they were 34,000.

So if Lyon can't sell out a 40,000 stadium every week when they have their best ever team winning title after title, then there's nothing to suggest that they could sell out a 60,000 stadium every week. Especially if the team starts performing poorly.

I believe France doesn't have a "travel culture". Many visiting clubs don't bring a lot of fans. The visitors sectors in French stadiums often seem way to big for the visiting team. Surely, this doesn't explain the 34.000 Lyon had a few seasons back, but it could mean they sell out their stadium (apart from the visitors sector) quite regurarly these days.

The Premiership ticket pricing is absurd! way overpriced, bloated and unsustainable. £35 minimum to see an Arsenal game; and even in the lower leagues, I went to watch Barnet play this season (league2 - thats the old division4) and it cost £17 to sit in a tin shed! thats what 25 euros?....Jesus!

I don't really care much for how successfull a league is financially...no change that, yes I do! I hope that the top 20 clubs in that stupid deloitte list get forced to start distributing their wealth around a bit more to fund grass roots so we don't get to the state that Serie A has found itself in. Theres also something wrong when the weekly wage of a football player is more than the entire yearly earnings of a whole terrace.

I like like the French and Dutch leagues because they aren't swimming in odious amounts of wealth and yet still produce strong teams, PSV, Lyon and Monaco

While any English fan would most likely welcome a drop in ticket prices they do actually help the wealth get distributed downwards (along with the collective TV deal) since everyone can make money from them unlike massive endorsements. I don't think its a coincidense for example that while the clubs at the top of the rich list make pretty similar amounts in England, Spain and Italy there are 8 prem clubs in the top 20 compaired to 5 italian and 3 spainish. So really in terms of who wins the top league I'd guess the prem is actually fairer than most of the decent sized leagues around europe, the gap is between it and div 1.

The english premiership is in fact quite fair. They have many entrants in the top 20 because tv-revenue is shared and because all clubs have good/decent facilities to secure a good match day income.

The german league is the same. Its way cheaper there still but crowds are increasing rapidly at their new venues and so is their tv income.

I hope France is moving in the same direction as England and Germany.
They will never quite get there because you cant suddenly create millions of new fans willing to spend as heavily as in England but smaller leagues dont have to be absolutely on par financially. as long as the gap isnt too big they can compete and its excellent if it happens.
The same goes for Holland and hopefully many other leagues.

Italy is simply falling apart.
The league is being destroyed by inequality, selfishness, debt, terrible facilities, and not least hooliganism. Crowds continue to drop rapidly, and who would want to visit these places with tall fencing, or even plexi-glass walls and complete cages for away fans.
I hope they start to fix their league, as it simply cant continue. I would fear though that a few at the top may instead just try to leave behind the mess and seek a new international competition

The english premiership is in fact quite fair. They have many entrants in the top 20 because tv-revenue is shared and because all clubs have good/decent facilities to secure a good match day income.

The german league is the same. Its way cheaper there still but crowds are increasing rapidly at their new venues and so is their tv income.

I hope France is moving in the same direction as England and Germany.
They will never quite get there because you cant suddenly create millions of new fans willing to spend as heavily as in England but smaller leagues dont have to be absolutely on par financially. as long as the gap isnt too big they can compete and its excellent if it happens.
The same goes for Holland and hopefully many other leagues.

Italy is simply falling apart.
The league is being destroyed by inequality, selfishness, debt, terrible facilities, and not least hooliganism. Crowds continue to drop rapidly, and who would want to visit these places with tall fencing, or even plexi-glass walls and complete cages for away fans.
I hope they start to fix their league, as it simply cant continue. I would fear though that a few at the top may instead just try to leave behind the mess and seek a new international competition

Indeed, while its commonly stated that attendances are down merely because pretty much all games are on TV the above factors are most likely why fans are choosing to watch games at home. I think that italian football would actually have been better off if FIFA threw the book at Inter in the champs league last season(kicked them out of it for at least 1 season) thus giving them some reason to take serious action without needing a disaster to happen.

The english premiership is in fact quite fair. They have many entrants in the top 20 because tv-revenue is shared and because all clubs have good/decent facilities to secure a good match day income.


Yes fair in the sense that all the teams manage to get a slice of the pie rather than crumbs, but its not fair on the fans. You have to concede that ticket prices are mercenary. Maybe the Germans have the right model (not sure for how long unfortunately) great support, great stadia and realistic ticket prices.
£30.00 + for a premiership ticket is not a particulary healthy situation.
I even saw Real at the Bernabeu 3 years ago and only paid £10.......thats £7 cheaper than Barnet!!!!

I believe France doesn't have a "travel culture". Many visiting clubs don't bring a lot of fans. The visitors sectors in French stadiums often seem way to big for the visiting team. Surely, this doesn't explain the 34.000 Lyon had a few seasons back, but it could mean they sell out their stadium (apart from the visitors sector) quite regurarly these days.

Wouldn't they just make the visitors section far smaller? If the away team can only sell 400 tickets, then you would only have to make the away section about 1000 seats. I know this depends on the stadium design, but I see no reason why it couln't be done in Lyon, as they don't give the away team a whole stand. They split it up, so why not simply change the split so the away team gets less seats?

Wouldn't they just make the visitors section far smaller? If the away team can only sell 400 tickets, then you would only have to make the away section about 1000 seats. I know this depends on the stadium design, but I see no reason why it couln't be done in Lyon, as they don't give the away team a whole stand. They split it up, so why not simply change the split so the away team gets less seats?

I don't know the French situation so I can't answer those questions. In Holland however, visitors sectors are determined by the size of the stadium. Ajax, Feyenoord and PSV all need to have a visitor sector of at least 1600 seats. They have to offer this capacity and can't use any of it for their own fans, even if the visiting team only uses half of their allocated tickets. I can imagine something similar is the case in France.

I don't know the French situation so I can't answer those questions. In Holland however, visitors sectors are determined by the size of the stadium. Ajax, Feyenoord and PSV all need to have a visitor sector of at least 1600 seats. They have to offer this capacity and can't use any of it for their own fans, even if the visiting team only uses half of their allocated tickets. I can imagine something similar is the case in France.


In Scotland, Rangers away section changes from 400 up to 7500 depending on who the away team is. Yesterday Hibs got 4000. I suppose the French model may be a fixed number!! Any Frenchies got any info on this?

^^^^^^^^^

Besides attendance levels and money I am most impressed with the French football academy system which they introduced in the early 1970s. With any luck we will do something similar in Oz. If the Scots have any brains they would do likewise.

Yes fair in the sense that all the teams manage to get a slice of the pie rather than crumbs, but its not fair on the fans. You have to concede that ticket prices are mercenary. Maybe the Germans have the right model (not sure for how long unfortunately) great support, great stadia and realistic ticket prices.
£30.00 + for a premiership ticket is not a particulary healthy situation.
I even saw Real at the Bernabeu 3 years ago and only paid £10.......thats £7 cheaper than Barnet!!!!

I agree completly. Its not fair... At Barnet!

Most premiership teams fill their grounds, so to lower prices would just lead to much less income for the clubs, which would indirectly also hurt lower leagues and of course new places like Emirates would never have been built.

Fewer people would actually get to premiership football if prices were lowered becuase expansions would not be affordable.
Instead of being priced out people would just be on 10-year waiting lists. pointless.

At the lower levels I do think prices are a scandal. Your example is shocking. Stadiums arent full at this level and it would be good if teams there could steal the fans that cant get into the premiership.

Often I think lower league clubs only make a small profit from having high prices because lower prices would also mean bigger crowds (when they have the capacity.) It just doesnt quite add up, I guess.

The best thing the premiership could do would be to offer a small financial assistance to lower level clubs that lowered their prices because as I said, I think many lower league clubs only make a small profit from having high prices.

Yes it's true that the away team are never filling up the seat ... But unfortunately France is a little bigger than Holland and England... And our fans are just not sold on going to some games 700 km away... Especially in some stadiums i.e Lille, Strasbourg, Auxerre, Ajaccio, Nice, Metz are either too distant from most other city or have really crapy stadiums the palm goes to Ajaccio once again... 8000 seats unfinished and you have to take the Ferry or the plane to get there... Nice will have a brand new stadium within 3 years...Lille will wait probably a bit longer... Strasbourg's stadium needs a complete make over... From my point of view Marseille has a great stadium but when it rains ... Paris my dear hometown, has a good stadium, but terrible fans and uncommital ownership... Lens have the best crowd but the club doesn't have the same money than before... Toulouse and Rennes are getting there with 35000 seats available and pretty much no public yet ... Lyon has a 41000 seats stadium and has to drop 2000 seats to the away team for each home game ...make the count yourself it make 39000... Lyon are selling out most of their game but just like in Italie or Spain some teams aren't attractive enough for the people to get to Gerland...we don't have the same great fanatic attitude than you guys

Can someone remind me the consolidated loss of English clubs? :hilarious

Bender, nous need vous dans le Forum Allemand!

French venues all look pretty old. Did they build or renovate any stadiums for the 98 wc? I gotta admit the Stade de France is IMO the most beautiful stadium in the world but the rest isn't all that great.

Just to put this in perspective. the English Championship (league 2)

Was the 4th biggest league in Europe last year in terms of attendences (it also has the biggest club game in the world, potentially worth up to £35m)

This was ahead of Seria A (Italy) and The French Premier

only the Premiership, Bundesliga and La Liga were ahead of it. Shows the depth of the English game.

Just to put this in perspective. the English Championship (league 2)

Was the 4th biggest league in Europe last year in terms of attendences (it also has the biggest club game in the world, potentially worth up to £35m)

This was ahead of Seria A (Italy) and The French Premier

only the Premiership, Bundesliga and La Liga were ahead of it. Shows the depth of the English game.

Not quite true. the top leagues in France and Italy were also ahead. just.
If prices were lowered to continental levels, it would probably go past them to be 4th.

Wouldn't they just make the visitors section far smaller? If the away team can only sell 400 tickets, then you would only have to make the away section about 1000 seats. I know this depends on the stadium design, but I see no reason why it couln't be done in Lyon, as they don't give the away team a whole stand. They split it up, so why not simply change the split so the away team gets less seats?

I'm not certain, but it could be a safety issue, because in France every visitors sector I've seen is at least separated by a large fence, meaning they have to make at least one block of seat available for the visitors. Not like in england where they can just have stewards acting as a wall. Heres an example from Marseille.

http://i7.photobucket.com/albums/y283/Ultras88/Ultras%20Dinamo/ultras7.jpg

Not quite true. the top leagues in France and Italy were also ahead. just.
If prices were lowered to continental levels, it would probably go past them to be 4th.

WHAT ARE YOU ON ABOUT?

You question everything without knowing the facts.

The Football League are to announce tomorrow that the Coca-Cola Championship attracted more fans last season than Italy's top-flight Serie A. The figures make it the fourth-best attended league in Europe, with a total of 9.8 million spectators, after the Premiership (12.88 million), the German Bundesliga (11.57 million) and Spain's La Liga (10.92 million).

WHAT ARE YOU ON ABOUT?

You question everything without knowing the facts.

but how many games are in English league 2, and how many does Serie A has, it will be better to compare the average per game.

Just to put this in perspective. the English Championship (league 2)

Was the 4th biggest league in Europe last year in terms of attendences (it also has the biggest club game in the world, potentially worth up to £35m)

This was ahead of Seria A (Italy) and The French Premier

only the Premiership, Bundesliga and La Liga were ahead of it. Shows the depth of the English game.


No it wasn't. I'm not going through this again!! (although I will). Stop exaggerating. Championship crowds are very good, but stop trying to exaggerate -

2004/2005 averages -

Italy - 25.472
France - 21.392
Championship - 17.410

Stop this nonsense about number of spectators a year. The Championship has 21% more games, so of course it will have a greater total per year. It does not mean it is more popular. If Serie A had 24 teams instead of 20 teams, then it would have higher totals than the Championship. Same goes for France. You cannot compare the total figures for a league with 380 games a year to one with 552 games a year!!

To compare these leagues, you would take the Italian total figure and multiply it by 552, then divide it by 380. This would give you a fair comparison. When you do this, Italy is first, then France, then the Championship.

WHAT ARE YOU ON ABOUT?

You question everything without knowing the facts.

Well as others have already said, average attendances is really the fairest way of comparing.

(Of course the english second level is then handicapped by having 24 teams as it would most likely be low crowd teams that would go down if the league was reduced to 20. but averages are still the best comparison)

Italian crowds continue to drop, down 15% so far this season, to be around 21,500 (same as France.) so the gap is really narrowing fast and it can only really be described as very embarrassing for italian football

the eight stadiums home to the 1998 world cup had a lifting or a deeper make over.
all, now account at leat 35000 seats, the problem is that only eight cities were concerned:
Paris: Parc des Princes - 48000 seats
Marseille: Stade Vélodrome - 60000
Bordeaux: Chaband Delmas - 35000 (aka Parc Lescure)
Montpellier: La Mosson - 35000 (now playing in Ligue 2 french second division)
Toulouse: Municipal - 36000 (french little Wembley also great for rugby)
Lens: Bollaert 42000
Lyon: Gerland 42000
Nantes: La Beaujoire 42000
St Etienne: Geoffroy Guichard - 37000 (aka Le Chaudron)
Plus St Denis: Stade de France of course 80000 seats (not used by Ligue 1)

All these numbers are not accurate more some stadium received screens and other stuffs modifying them a bit. So it makes 7 really good stadiums to watch good average games, my favorite is Toulouse for, it's just a beautiful stadium.

They are no wembley, Anfield or Old Trafford... But they are still pretty decent stadium! Absolutely nothing to be jealous about Italy for exemple. last year the ligue 1 had an average 21000 Which is good if you realise that the others stadium are:
Ajaccio - 8000 seats,
Sochaux - 20000
Strasbourg - 29000
Lille - 17000
Nice - 17000
Monaco - 18000
Auxerre - 22000
Metz - 28000
Rennes - 35000 (they just finished it last year)

So 21500 not that bad at all if you take in consideration ligue 1 average seating capacity...

As to the mandatory away team sector in the stadium; it is between 500 hundreds for Ajaccio to 2000 for Marseille with an average of 15000. However if you look at this good picture from Breakwood... You have to give them seats, and also creat a fence and put some space between them and other fans (especially for Paris and Marseille don't hesitate to put some barbwire). So we loose a bit of capacity and when you look at the picture there's no more need to talk fans just don't travel with their team,except for Marseille and Lens.

so with regard to ticket pricing and attendances the french can adopt either the english method more expensive tickets but slightly lower attendances or the german method huge attendance and cheap tickets.

Personally i believe french football would benefit more from adopting a german style approach and increase the popularity of the league before eventually raising ticket prices closer to the english level

so with regard to ticket pricing and attendances the french can adopt either the english method more expensive tickets but slightly lower attendances or the german method huge attendance and cheap tickets.

It's not the English method, as such. That would be looking at it back to front.

English ticket prices are so high because there is such a big demand that clubs can afford to charge high ticket prices. The only reason why attendances in England are slightly smaller than in Germany is that, on average, Bundesliga stadiums are now much bigger than their Premiership counterparts. We should see a rise in attendances in the Premiership as and when new stadiums are built (eg Emirates) or old ones are redeveloped (eg Old Trafford) but, sadly, I doubt that we will see a concomitant reduction in ticket prices.

I guess that the task for French football is to discover which markets show most potential for growth. Could they attract many more poor, working class fans or is there a market for more middle class fans who expect better quality facilities and a higher level of product? Apologies for talking about the beautiful game in such crude business terminology!

No it wasn't. I'm not going through this again!! (although I will). Stop exaggerating. Championship crowds are very good, but stop trying to exaggerate -

2004/2005 averages -

Italy - 25.472
France - 21.392
Championship - 17.410

Stop this nonsense about number of spectators a year. The Championship has 21% more games, so of course it will have a greater total per year. It does not mean it is more popular. If Serie A had 24 teams instead of 20 teams, then it would have higher totals than the Championship. Same goes for France. You cannot compare the total figures for a league with 380 games a year to one with 552 games a year!!

To compare these leagues, you would take the Italian total figure and multiply it by 552, then divide it by 380. This would give you a fair comparison. When you do this, Italy is first, then France, then the Championship.

It's not an exaggeration at all. Just another way of looking at the figures. The championship pulls in more spectators over a seaon than Serie A and La Liga. Not per game of course but more paying spectators is more paying spectators.

It's not an exaggeration at all. Just another way of looking at the figures. The championship pulls in more spectators over a seaon than Serie A and La Liga. Not per game of course but more paying spectators is more paying spectators.

One league has 552 games, the other league has 380. You cannot compare total number of spectators.

We all know that Serie A has better crowds. You know it, I know it. Championship crowds are very good, but don't try and bend the truth.

According to your logic, the Championship is more popular that the World Cup Finals!!

Frederic Thiriez, the president of the French ligue, has declared that French clubs are 15 years behind the English ones when it comes to stadium, and I must say he's totally right. The reason, cities are owning stadium, not clubs which makes very difficult for clubs to invest in their ground. But from now on, Clubs could access the stock market, only if they owned their stadiums. We can expect to see more clubs shifting from renting to possess their ground in order to get extra money from the stock market (only Auxerre, Ajaccio and Lens (for 99 years) own their grounds).

Here is a very interesting link to all the new French stadium and how they've been or will be financed. It presents as well the English and German model in terms of stadium managment. It's in French btw.

http://www.footpro.fr/magazine/pdf/footpro14.pdf

On top of my mind here are all the new French stadium:

Nice (35,000) new one on a new location
Grenoble (25,000) new one build on the old one
Le Mans (25,000) new one on a new location
Lyon (55,000/60,000) new one on a new location
Marseille (80,000) extension of the existing one
Clermont Ferrand (35,000) extension of the existing one
Reims (around 24,000) new one build on the old one
Lille (the sized will be fixed according to the chosen location, but they want to build an ArenA like stadium of 55,000 seats)
Montpellier (20,000) for rugby club
Paris (20,000) for rugby club

Rising ticket prices is a bad idea, in the end you still want the best value for your money...The french championship is not the most spectacular one. Lowering prices is good but if you can't buy good player at the end of the season is no good either. building bigger stadium. Yes good idea where do you find the money.Cities were in charge for a long time and don't want that burden anymore. The easiest way for France to have newer stadium would be to welcome the next Europe Championship
and to choose 6 cities who were not involved in the world cup : It could be Grenoble, Strasbourg, Nice, Lille, Le Havre... and have these cities to build 40000+ mini stade de france

French are right to build new stadium but I am sorry there's no point in building ridiculiously undersized stadiums... Grenoble as no doubt the crowd capacity to build at least A 35000 seats stadium extendable to 40000 and they are building a 22000 not 25000 stadium it's just retarded...
How do you fundrase money with such a thing. Tickets money is the key to start building a club... especially in France where corporations are reluctant to invest heavy amount of money in sports...
Besides Ligue 1 would be better off with only 18 or better 16 clubs with all the necessary structures: stadium, coaching staff, training center, marketing department, merchandising strategies... Look at Lens this is a 16000 Habitants city with more the 30000 season ticket holders, because the stadium is big enough they where able to attract Orange as main sponsor a few years ago.

If cities are planning new stadiums they should do them according to the finals goal of their clubs not just to build a stadium... By the way the new Montpellier rugby stadium will be 12000 seats plus another 3000 "standing positions".

Last point England and Italy are the exemple that stock market is not the solution to raise the money they want ... My point of view is that only Lyon can access it oncce the new stadium will be built, on the condition that they still do good in the championship and also on their merchandising activities which are now booming. Look at lasio the only reason they are still in serie A is that having them in serie B would create tremendous riots... Chelsea is ok thanks to Abramovitch, Manchester went out of the market because the Yankee got in... Are the others doing good not? so much!

As to comparing european attendences that is just unfair if you don't balance your results; the number of games per season, the number of teams per championship, size of the stadium... it's easy to say england or Italy as the best crowd, in this case I'll just take the north corean championship... You have six stadium above 100000 seats... My point is England has the first championship in Europe, followed by Spain, Germany, Italy and France... Best crowd!? If all stadium in scotland were like Celtic Park and Ibrox we would all shut up!

new ground for Nizza

http://www.stadionwelt.de/stadionwelt_stadien/images/news/nizza_05_01_2006_1.jpg

http://www.stadionwelt.de/stadionwelt_stadien/images/news/nizza_05_01_2006_2.jpg

It will have a capacity of 32k

It's not an exaggeration at all. Just another way of looking at the figures. The championship pulls in more spectators over a seaon than Serie A and La Liga. Not per game of course but more paying spectators is more paying spectators.

Sure, and if Luxembourg's first league had 10,000 games a year, it would boast the highest attendance figures of any European league.

Marseille stadium with 80 000 seats :

http://eur.i1.yimg.com/eur.news1.yimg.com/eur.yimg.com/ng/sp/afpji/20051214/051214174750.6erm2wl90b.jpg

It's sad the PSG doesn't want to take Stade de France, there would be 2 stadiums of 80 000 seats in first french league, but it's not impossible that PSG changes its mind, and "offer" Parc des Princes to the rugby club Stade Français !

Also i am pretty sure Lille will built a stadium with a retractable roof like cardiff or amsterdam, it would be the first of this type in France :)

PSG will not go to SDF. They have a lease for the Parc des Princes they built their HQ on one side with restaurant, superstore conference center... Parc des Prince is nicer thant SDF which is too cold from my point of view... Besides although it's not so old they did not think of any concession shops - other than food corners when they built it - so the club would have to modify it anyway... Recently the club was thinking about a roof but it was to pricey 50 M euros... And they want to build luxury suite too

As to the Stade Francais rugby team they will have Jean Bouin rebuilt by 2012 according to the mayor Delanoe..with Lagardere involved in the project it will be a 20000 all seater entirely covered.

According to the last rumor lille new stadium would be an arena type stadium with 50000 seats and if lucky they would start building in 2007 it would be near Lille Airport

One league has 552 games, the other league has 380. You cannot compare total number of spectators.

We all know that Serie A has better crowds. You know it, I know it. Championship crowds are very good, but don't try and bend the truth.

According to your logic, the Championship is more popular that the World Cup Finals!!


Agreed. There's nothing wrong with anyone's mathematics.

If we take this season's figures and extrapolate then Serie A will attract 8.2M. The Championship will attract 9.5M.

Therefor the Championship will attract more paying spectators this season.

Serie A gets better crowds per game 21,635 vs 17,296. Frankly there's very little in it.

The Championship is clearly not more popular than the World Cup. Your desperation is showing. I beleive the total WCQ campaign pulls in about 20M though I've no idea of the average I imagine is't below 10,000 due to the diversity and the huge number of minor nations who enter.

I think the 'Big 12' in college football (USA) pulls in an average of over 80,000 per game. Does this make it more popular than any other sport on the planet? Of course not.

PSG will not go to SDF. They have a lease for the Parc des Princes they built their HQ on one side with restaurant, superstore conference center... Parc des Prince is nicer thant SDF which is too cold from my point of view... Besides although it's not so old they did not think of any concession shops - other than food corners when they built it - so the club would have to modify it anyway... Recently the club was thinking about a roof but it was to pricey 50 M euros... And they want to build luxury suite too

As to the Stade Francais rugby team they will have Jean Bouin rebuilt by 2012 according to the mayor Delanoe..with Lagardere involved in the project it will be a 20000 all seater entirely covered.

According to the last rumor lille new stadium would be an arena type stadium with 50000 seats and if lucky they would start building in 2007 it would be near Lille Airport

But if OM gets a 80 000 stadium, and OL a new modern stadium of 60 000, Parc des Princes will look ridiculous with its 50 000 seats, France is still a centralized country, PSG will not like to be overpassed by OM !... It's like if Manchester would try to built something bigger that the new wembley !...

... It's like if Manchester would try to built something bigger that the new wembley !...

I beleive that's pretty likely. Manchester United's next phase of construction is likely to involve both southern quadrants and the south stand giving a capacity of over 90,000.

Agreed. There's nothing wrong with anyone's mathematics.

If we take this season's figures and extrapolate then Serie A will attract 8.2M. The Championship will attract 9.5M.

Therefor the Championship will attract more paying spectators this season.

Serie A gets better crowds per game 21,635 vs 17,296. Frankly there's very little in it.

The Championship is clearly not more popular than the World Cup. Your desperation is showing. I beleive the total WCQ campaign pulls in about 20M though I've no idea of the average I imagine is't below 10,000 due to the diversity and the huge number of minor nations who enter.

I think the 'Big 12' in college football (USA) pulls in an average of over 80,000 per game. Does this make it more popular than any other sport on the planet? Of course not.

"World Cup Finals" was what I said, not 'World Cup campaign'

USA football is the most popular league in the world as it has the highest averages. Anybody with half a brain knows that you compare averages. Total number of spectators can only be compared if you have roughly the same number of games. As the other chap said, if Luxembourg's first league had 10,000 games a year, it would boast the highest attendance figures of any European league.

Thankfully, nearly every neutral on the board agrees Serie A is above the Championship in terms of popularity as they have a higher average. Only english 'fanboys' are going to say the Championship is more popular!!

But if OM gets a 80 000 stadium, and OL a new modern stadium of 60 000, Parc des Princes will look ridiculous with its 50 000 seats, France is still a centralized country, PSG will not like to be overpassed by OM !... It's like if Manchester would try to built something bigger that the new wembley !...

OM already has 60.000+ seats, so they overpassed PSG long time ago.

exact a long long time ago

Besides PSG could easily put another few thousands seats on the lower part of the stadium... They just don't have the money and also they have a huge fan problem.
Anyway as a Parisian born I don't really like SDF for football, it's great for rugby especially when scotish and irish fans are in town. But for football it's just cold...
Besides the psg is really at home in Parc des Princes... I wouldn't mind going there for Champions League games, if Paris was to one day get back in the big league. But at the moment it's unlikely this team has been in a huge rebuild process for the last 5 years and so far it looks like they aren't finished yet.
I hope that Lyon stadium will be more of a 60 something than a 50000...I want Lille to do us a nice covered arena SDF with a track for the athletic meeting. Lens will upgrade the main stands soon and they could reach the 50000too... Nice should just build the 40000 seats directly instead of doing just the 32000. I am pissed off at the Grenoble stadium.

"World Cup Finals" was what I said, not 'World Cup campaign'

USA football is the most popular league in the world as it has the highest averages. Anybody with half a brain knows that you compare averages. Total number of spectators can only be compared if you have roughly the same number of games. As the other chap said, if Luxembourg's first league had 10,000 games a year, it would boast the highest attendance figures of any European league.

Thankfully, nearly every neutral on the board agrees Serie A is above the Championship in terms of popularity as they have a higher average. Only english 'fanboys' are going to say the Championship is more popular!!

Average crowds are obviously more relevant than aggregate crowds but you can hardly use that to say that USA football is the most popular league in the world.

Anyway in your eagernes to put down the english league, you should probably remember that its actually amazing that the Italian top league is even being compared to the english second level... thats pretty shocking for italian football.

its actually amazing that the Italian top league is even being compared to the english second level... thats pretty shocking for italian football.


It wasn't always like this though. The Italian top division used to lead in almost every category in the late 1980's and early 1990's.

The robustness of English crowds outside the top level is truly remarkable.

It might be interesting to look at League One compared to top flights as well. Shall we decide to look at averages or aggregates? :jk:

Average crowds are obviously more relevant than aggregate crowds but you can hardly use that to say that USA football is the most popular league in the world.

Anyway in your eagernes to put down the english league, you should probably remember that its actually amazing that the Italian top league is even being compared to the english second level... thats pretty shocking for italian football.

erm....you seem to be confused!! I said Championship crowds were superb in a number of my posts. I am simply pointing out that they are not quite as good as Italian crowds (because some people were stating that they were!!).

Oh my dear 'Danish' chum - not everybody is out to get England you know!!

USA football is the the most popular league in the world - I don't like it myself, but you can't hide the facts!! Whether it is a fair to compare this league to others is a different matter (Although I suspect that If USA football played 34-38 games a year, it would still have by far the highest average crowds!).

In comparaison (project/club)

Marseille:80000
Lyon:60000
Lille:55000
Paris:45000

Manchester:75000
Arsenal:60000
Liverpool:60000
Newcastle:52000

Do the hardcore supporters of 'FC Nancy' go by the name of 'The Nancy Boys'?

lol hum no I don't remember hearinf that name ever... But I don't think they would mind

lol hum no I don't remember hearinf that name ever... But I don't think they would mind

Well to be honest I doubt PSG needs a bigger stadium at this point.
But if they do manage to get some momentum in the next few years and attendance rises, I think they should leave the Parc.
I'm an avid PSG fan, and as much as I liked going to the Parc, I find it ugly, from the inside-out. I prefer to see it destroyed, and they should rebuild a new modern stadium. But the problem is, as you mentioned, they built the offices outside, and the lounges, the restaurant, etc. and I doubt they want to tear it all down now.

AS ( association sportive = sport association ) nancy lorraine ( asnl ) , not fc nancy .

I do like Parc des Prince better than SDF which is really cold from an atmosphere point of view. it's ok looking with the blue and read seats. Besides PSG fans are a shame and they don't deserve a better stadium... Sorry to say that but it's true. A few upgrades like adding two thousands seats near the pitch should do. They also need new reception areas and luxury suites and that's it. Tear the Parc des Prince down is almost impossible anyway as it's right above the péripherique... They might need a roof too, but it's way to pricey... The one stadium which is really likely to be destroyed in Paris is Charletty

Parc des Princes architect is the one that did the Olympic Stadium of Montréal, the stadium has an architectural value and also a relationship value between France and Quebec :)

25000 seats for Le Mans :

http://www.batiactu.com/special/image.php3?type=Premier_image&doc=/data/20012006/20012006-094855.html

Paris SG new ownership is planning to improve seating capacities to +/- 54000 by lowering the pitch. Hey here is an idea.

Paris SG new ownership is planning to improve seating capacities to +/- 54000 by lowering the pitch. Hey here is an idea.

Maybe PSG's new owners should worry about the Tigris and Boulogne killing each other first. :runaway: Then once they fix that problem then they can worry about expanding :hahaha:

Have to say I was really impressed with Monaco's Prince Louis stadium just down the hill from the Palace.

It blends in well with the neighbourhood and looks superb inside as well.

I really think, with the one exception of the SDF, that the stadium expansion in France for the 98 world cup are far below average.

Ok, you probably know that I hate the SDf but I admit it is the big and beautiful stadium and we needed it.

Pris will never move of Prac des prince because they are home? like marseille is home in the veoldrome.
Both team coul very expand the capacity and lift the beauty of their stadium but will never move out.

I'm starting to be a little bit lost with Lyon.
First of all, 2/3 yeas ago, JM Aulas (lyon president and owner) wanted a 70.000 seats stadium. A year ago he pushed for a 60.000 one and from what i've heard on TV, it's seems that he would now be happy with a 55.000 one.
I'm really asking what he really want.
If lyon end up with a beautiful but expansive 45/50.000 stadium, it will be a lot of money spent for nothing because the only thing Lyon needs with the stadium is to improve the capacity by 15/20/25.000.
I thing 60.000 is the least we can accept.

For nice I agree that they should go directly to the second step of 40.000 instead of building a 32.000 with a stand unfinished that could fill 8.000 more people.

I hope Lens will also upgrade the look of its stadium because expansion of the capacity is not urgent.

And to conclude, I would say that Lille doesn't need a 50.000 stadium, even if I hope they will build it.

Lille is all about claude PUEL's magic and not a team that could be on top on the long term.

true for lyon , aulas wants to finish with a new 35000 seats stadium with a giant shopping mall , that's good for him , not for the fans whom he does not care at all .

Good to see France is finally doing something about its stadium situation, but realisticly, it will be many many years before the French league is up to the standard of the English, Spanish or German!

Good to see France is finally doing something about its stadium situation, but realisticly, it will be many many years before the French league is up to the standard of the English, Spanish or German!

I believe that French football is allready on par with Germany. With Lyon dominating the League, it will force the other clubs to improve, and in a couple years the French League will have passed Gemany, In my opinion.

Lyon new stadium will receive final approval before june 1st... the stadium will be a 55 to 60000 seats likely in venissieux or near Lyon international airport.
Lyon just annonced a big sponsoring contract with a major french firm for 45 millions euros over the next five years ... Which is a good 9 millions per year the total value of the OL jersey is now reaching around 15 million a year... The idea for Lyon is to have an hotel in the stadium the way Chelsea does and probably be surrounded by a mall.

Paris new ownership should annonce their plan regarding improvement for Parc des Prince before the next season starts. It is likely to be a 52000 seater with luxury suite improvement plan. Lens do have a plan to rebuild their oldest grand stand that would get them very close to a 50000+ configuration but they are in no hurry since they are now trying to rebuild a competitive team first.

I disagree with Vilak I think lille deserve a 50000 seater... if it could be like a mini stade de france with a retractable athletic track it would be great for both football and the track and field meating.

Maybe Neda SAy... maybe.
Wathever they deserve it or not, i'm a little bit lost with this so much anticipated stadium. When? how big? where. Those questions need to be aswered now, not in few years when claude puel will be back in monaco.

I've heard in another topic that french can't bare themselve to build beautiful stadium. That's true for the big stadium like SDF, marseille, parc des prince and all the future stadium taht are going to be erected but frankly, the lens stadium, as well as other needs a real lifting.

Lens deserve a big stadium but i don't think they have the money to improve Bollaert.

I think the parc des prince could add between 3000/5000 places in reconstructing the two "behind the goal" stands and advancing them by 20 meters (a la nou camp).

I find Ligue 1 very enjoyable, I watch ever Sunday afternoon

The one stadium which is really likely to be destroyed in Paris is Charletty

Why would they destroy Charletty??!! Paris is already lacking of decent stadiums and Charlety, by its size, is the third biggest stadium of Paris (20,000). Besides, it has just been refurbished recently.

Never said they were going to do it. I said it is the most likely... Charletty is not used except for the final of the French Championship of American football. A few years ago it welcomed track and field meetings and a dozen event a year now it is almost useless... I love Charletty, the design is great the seating is good but the Stade Français (Paris rugby team) just turn it down as future home... Besides it will not be Paris third stadium Stade Jean Bouin (Parc des Prince little brother is going to have an "extreme make over" to reach 20-22000 seats. So four stadiums above 20000... It would be ok in the UK cause you'd have a Paris fc in french ligue 2 but Paris fc is actually playing in 5th division.

Vilak: Parc des Prince could have 8000 additionals seats by setting the pitch 70 centimeter than it actually is, according to the architect ; the sidelines and the stands behing the goals would be restructured

Never though it would go so far as 8000 Neda Say.

Great info thank you.

Parc des Prince could have 8000 additionals seats by setting the pitch 70 centimeter than it actually is, according to the architect ; the sidelines and the stands behing the goals would be restructured


Really?

How can they do it? Such a gain seems a little too much.

French football is a vastly untapped sport with huge potential.
Just kick out the yobs and market it to the public the same as the premiership has brought success to England.
The fat that this league can draw players from throughout the Francophonie world makes for fantastic football.
If I was a wealthy businessman, I'd by a french club like Nantes or Bordeaux and develop it beyond imagination, take Arsene Wenger as appointed Chairman with Robert Pires as player-coach

for the parc des prince I belived that they could do only 4000 seats but the plan is actually really clever.
First you take the pitch off then you dig the ground about 1 meter deep all around the pitch.Then you get the new pitch to stand on a 30 centimeter ground layer, the stand standing directly on the new ground. you get an old trafford configuration the sidelines seats are going to be very very close to the action just like in Highbury.

Paris
80000 Stade de France
54000 Parc des Princes - PSG - expansion

Lyon
65000 New OL Stadium - OL - new
42000 Gerland - LOU (rugby club)

Marseille
80000 Stade Vélodrome - expansion

Lille
60000 New LOSC Stadium - LOSC - new
25000 Villeneuve d'asques

Bordeaux
35000 Chaban Delmas - maybe a new stadium

Nice
33000 Stade du Ray - new

Lens
50000 Stade Bolleart - expansion

Nantes
38000 La Beaujoire

Other cities :
Le Mans 25000 - new
Troyes 25000
Rennes 30000
Strasbourg 30000
Nancy 20000
Metz 25000
Auxerre 20000
Grenoble 20000 - new (+ 10000 - expansion)
Valenciennes 23000 - new
Amiens 20000 - expansion
Toulouse 35000
Saint-Etienne 35000 - maybe a new expansion

I really would love to see those figure actually accurate in futures expansion.

65000 for lyon is the less they can do (forget the removable roof)
60000 for lille seems very hudge for this club
50000 for lens seems necessary. lens has great fan base and working on the long term.

st etienne should also, due to their fan base, upgrade the facilities of their steidum in term of conform and seating numbers.

80000 for marseille is an absolute necessity I think.


I think bordeaux should also biuilt a new stadium. the acutal place is very outdated. the fans are far from action and no expansion is possible due to the 'historic monument" classification of the building.

Paris
80000 Stade de France
54000 Parc des Princes - PSG - expansion

Lyon
65000 New OL Stadium - OL - new
42000 Gerland - LOU (rugby club)

Marseille
80000 Stade Vélodrome - expansion

Lille
60000 New LOSC Stadium - LOSC - new
25000 Villeneuve d'asques

Bordeaux
35000 Chaban Delmas - maybe a new stadium

Nice
33000 Stade du Ray - new

Lens
50000 Stade Bolleart - expansion

Nantes
38000 La Beaujoire

Other cities :
Le Mans 25000 - new
Troyes 25000
Rennes 30000
Strasbourg 30000
Nancy 20000
Metz 25000
Auxerre 20000
Grenoble 20000 - new (+ 10000 - expansion)
Valenciennes 23000 - new
Amiens 20000 - expansion
Toulouse 35000
Saint-Etienne 35000 - maybe a new expansion


sùr que les girondins ont besoin d'un nouveau stade mais çà a t'il dejà été evoqué par le club ces derniers tps d'en construire un autre ? les projets pour lyon et lille ( 40 à 50 pour lille pas 60 ) sont connus , pour marseille , gaudin est clairement un frein pour l'augmentation de capacité ( jarte aux prochaines muni ? ) , nancy veut aggrandir marcel picot à 30000 , mais pas d'infos sur bordeaux . Je doute de tte maniere qu'ils n'y aient jamais pensé vue le standing du club , les projets des autres clubs ainsi que la vetusté de lescure-chaban , un stade moderne de 45000 places serait parfait pour eux .

Expension in St Etienne and new stadium in bordeaux. I think that you are day dreaming Bordeaux is a good club but they struggle to fill up Lescure besides. I like Lescure it should get some touch up in terms of confort that's ityou can reshape the behind the goals area add a few rows alond sidelines but build a new stadium in Bordeaux nope bad idea.
As for St Etienne it is a great club with fantastic history good fan base able to fill the stadium easily but would they have the money to expand and more importantly the space around the stadium itself. I think Lille should get something around 50000 seats. The city has enough potential for that and the club is well structured. Nice is making a big mistake with his 33000 seater they should have it directly to 42000.

Gerland will be downsized to fit the LOU rugby club better,but only if they are to access Top 14 rugby league.

There is one stadium that I would like to get bigger: the Stadium of Toulouse aka little Wembley.... I'd like it to have a deck all aroud the pitch not just for the main stand... It's a wonderfull stadium, Toulouse is a great city with huge potential. It would be great for the TFC and more importantly the Stade Toulousain rugby club
It's just a dream though.

Last thing the Velodrome 80000: adding a roof makes a lot sense, luxury suites for business dudes also. But to add 20000 seats for the fans, you only do that if you are sure to play Champions league every year. I have seen the stadium half empty on many occasions. I am pretty sure they can find the money for it easily that 's not the point. It sounds like a good idea but it maybe be a bad one.

Neda say, I know that a 80.000 velodrome is not necessary and you are right about the average attendance and that most of time the stadium is not sold out (60.000 max actually i think). But I would Love it!!!!!!!!!

The stadium of toulouse is like bordeaux, it's classified historic monument.
$It would be hard to ex^pand it as you can't cange the outside architecture (including the roof of course).
I don't know it there is enough height between the top of the stand and the roof to build a second ring of seats (as they did for the astrodome in houston).

50.000 seems a little bit too much for lille but i'm probably wrong so I won't argue anymore about it.

Yes st etienne have anough space to expand on 3 of the 4 stand (exactlly like the early 90's old trafford).
the fourth stand has no railways behind it but just a street :

http://img227.imageshack.us/img227/4373/027fn1.th.jpg (http://img227.imageshack.us/my.php?image=027fn1.jpg)

and

http://img227.imageshack.us/img227/1984/044tu.th.jpg (http://img227.imageshack.us/my.php?image=044tu.jpg)

I don't know what really will happen.

I really hope the velodrome will get a roof and a possible but not necessary expansion of the seating.

Right now, the two clubs that really need to improve the seating are Lyon and Lille.
For the other team, it's the confort (roof, obstructed view, pitch view, seats design, stadium architecture) they needs to improve.

Parc des princes is perfect for PSG in all categories.

St etienne pics show you could double the capacity of the stadium with all this space around it but I won't it happen until france get the world cup or the euro wich is years years away from now.

It's sad the rugby world cup was not the opportunity to launch a new plan of stadiums renovation for all the choosen stadiums. football WC98 is 8 years past and it should have been cool, not to say necessary and undoubtfully cool!

thanks for the picture Vilak they are great ... I thought they finally build something around the stadium but obvisouly they did not so yes why not say a very hypothetical yes to this stadium expansion... Just add corners and reshape the stand might do it...
A derby Lyon-St etienne might be fun...

I can understand that people like the idea of the velodrome at 80 like San Siro close to Camp Nou and some other magical stadium but I can't help thinking OM is not stable enough to have a team to fill up this kind of huge vessel ...But for Chirst sake they had to a roof wind and rains are just terrible in this stadium...

I seriously think lille as the potential for a big stadium, they are economically healthy, stable in their result have a tremendous player development program a good staff and Lille habitants supporting them. Not a 60000 but sure a 50.

As for toulouse you're right the stadium is on the monument list, I was just day dreaming as I said. But this is a beautifull stadium It would be amazing to have deck there. There is not much space between the pitch and the roof but they have one deck on the main stand so technicaly it might be feasable to add a ring withouttouching the piece of art that the roof is. However they are no studies to prove my point. à

I am thinking about one stadium that I would just destroy and rebuild tell me if you agree la Meineau in Strasbourg, yuk this one needs to disapear

It was a pleasure for the pix.

I don't think they can fill the corners at st etienne because of difference of height, deepth, angle and numbers of tiers but it might be possible.

I don't think la meineau in strasbourg is that ugly. It is surely not a beautiful stadium but I don't rate it as a bad stadium in term of pitch view and comfort.
I think we could add another ring to put the capacity to around 40/45.000 then built a new facade under the top of the new ring to hide the existing facade.

La meinau :

http://img280.imageshack.us/img280/491/stasbourg0fm.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

and

http://img434.imageshack.us/img434/7903/strasgr12wc.th.jpg (http://img434.imageshack.us/my.php?image=strasgr12wc.jpg)

Lille are healthy you're right neda say but not because they have great income from merchandise, Tv (here I may be wrong cos' I don't know how the money is distributed) or tickets sales.
They are healthy but because they acquiered good players with low salaries and a genius in claude puel who made an united, competitive team of them.
Sometimes, they can have great income in term of transfert "indemnity" when they sell a player.
They do the best with what they have and it works well. they remind me Lyon at the middle of the 90's.

If they are able to remain a competitive team, to keep this behaviour, they may become a monster like aulas'OL in 6/10 years.
Then, I must admit, a 50.000 seats stadium would be necessary and should be a great asset for them.
Do you agree?

I totally agree with you on that.
That's why Seydoux 's priority is to Keep Puel, He's a top notch coach. They can make a lot of money with a big stadium, Lille Metropole is French fourth biggest city...
Their finances are healthy thanks to what you mentioned... They have good structures, they do well in maketing.That's why I don't think that they should have a 35000 stadium...they must go directly to 50000+ minimum... the space is there right in the middle with Villeneuve d'Asq. I hope they won't do Nice mistake.

From what I've seen, Lille stadium project doesn't have an empty space to future expension so building a 35.000 seats one and later wanting to improve it to a 50.000 ccapacity is indeed a mistake if the plan don't make easy a future extension. I think, with all going quick in today(s football that architects should been ordred to fullfill this objective : to make the stadium expandable with little cost.

I don't see it in the well known project :

http://img362.imageshack.us/img362/4449/grimon03a7qa.th.jpg (http://img362.imageshack.us/my.php?image=grimon03a7qa.jpg)

and

http://img362.imageshack.us/img362/250/grimonprez22gj.th.jpg (http://img362.imageshack.us/my.php?image=grimonprez22gj.jpg)

To the opposite, I thnk that nice was smart. they don't know if have a superb stadium will attract more than 30.000 on a frequent basis. If they realise they can, they will expand at low cost. If they realise they can't, they will keep the stadium as it is and be sure that the stadium won't seems half empty (or half full as you want) on TV.

la Meinau looks not too bad but the seating conditions are from another era... Alought Strasbourg is going to ligue 2, they must improve that aspect: the fanzones are really bad and the seats have been here for decades they need to add some color and please not sky blue it looks old, ugly and dirty after five weeks of rain...

As for Lille, the picture you're providing are not accurate anymore... new site...new stadium...new architecture... I hope the architect will grant them a rebate for this one. This stadium was using the old Grimon Prezjoris infrastructure...

As for Nice you may have a point however... Everybody is going to have a 30000+ stadium now... You need something else to have a competitive edge on the mercatos and a 42000 seater is just that. At the end of the year you made more money on a few games than the other teams ... That money can help you to land one or two very good players...

Didn't know this porject has been replaced.
Would be happy to have new project pix.

For Nice, you may be right, every ligue one team need a 30.000 seats stadium but I don't now if 10.000 more is tha ladder to future good time. it maybe; it maybe...

I don't know the infrastructure of la meinau so you are surely right.

I've heard that the first images of Lyon new stadium should be soon available. I'm very eager to see them.

There's no new pics on the Losc stadium cause no firm decision has been made regarding its site. Seydoux complained that the new stadium might take 3 to 5 years to be built cause they have to restart from ground zero.

Regarding La Meinau, you can just go check the pics on rc strasbourg webiste there is a direct link from the lfp website www.lfp.fr... It's not pretty

About nice stadium when you can look at tv money+merchandising+ ticket sales +sponsoring and then you look at who's doing what.

You just realise that big stadium goes with big time sponsor Lens: orange (for almost a decade), Paris: Opel then Thomson, Marseille: Neuf, Lyon Renault Trucks (for almost five years)... all the other clubs have to look for new sponsorship every one or two season. Not to hard to find but their amount of money is just not the same.
Big market (ie:city)+big stadium=big sponsor and then potentially if everything is working you get championsleague...

You'll say Lille is making me a liar of course but this is just how sport works ...
If a 30000 seater becomes the rule then you have to look for something to make you stand out because if everybody has the same quality on the pitch the investors start looking for something else... Generally how many you can drain from people going to the stadium. What you can sell them... This is not a football issue this is pure business... There is no point building a new stadium in Munich...You can say what you want the Olympia Stadion was a monster when full and pitch view was great.

Seydoux went to Lille because it's a big city. Index Corp went to Grenoble for the same reason except that they are starting from way further. Aulas made his move cause he realised that Lyon was a big market for his own company and football is a great way to communicate.


I am not really hopefull to see Auxerre, Metz or even Sochaux and Nancy Troyes being able to maintain their presence in ligue 1... What is now saving them is the quality of their player development programs... Bastia and Strasbourg had very good ones and it is no guarantee to stay in ligue 1...Money is no guarantee either...
But when you're Marseille big, you can have a shitty season, even go to ligue 2 and come back one year later with no money problem because big attendences saved your finances somehow.

You're very logic.
Yes i like the olympia stadion in berlin but from marketing standpoint, a new stadium was necessary.

If there's a lot of thing to plan concerning Lille stadium, we'r years away to see it actually built.

From where does Aulas come from (I means, what kind of companies does he own)?

It seems all need to be bigger and bigger with actual football.

You just realise that big stadium goes with big time sponsor Lens: orange (for almost a decade), Paris: Opel then Thomson, Marseille: Neuf, Lyon Renault Trucks (for almost five years)... all the other clubs have to look for new sponsorship every one or two season. Not to hard to find but their amount of money is just not the same.
Thomson is no more the sponsor of the PSG. New sponsor: Fly Emirates ?
Renault Trucks is no more the sponsor of the OL. New sponsor: Accor (Novotel and Ticket Restaurant).
Next year (07/08) after 3 years, Neuf telecom won't be the sponsor of the OM any more. We can't say that Khalifa Airways was a good investor...

Big market (ie:city)+big stadium=big sponsor and then potentially if everything is working you get championsleague...
Please could you remind me which teams will play the final of the Champion's league, tomorrow ? And what are their sponsor ? ;)

Which ones do you prefer ?
FC Barcelona
http://www.esseclive.com/partage/articles/sport_foot_maillotBarca.jpg

Athletic Bilbao
http://www.mmsport.dk/soccer-jersey/athletic-bilbao-home-jersey-2005-06.jpg

Racing Santander
http://www.futbolmanias.com/images/EQUIPOS%20LFP/EQUIPOS%20LFP%202005.2006/RACING_1a_2005.2006.jpg

AS Nancy Lorraine
http://www.asnl.net/photos/lemaillot2005_p.jpg

;)

Apparently PSG will never leave the Parc des Princes because the club is too tied with this stadium. However, I do believe that PSG needs a rival in Ligue 1, and that rival could easily feel up the Stade de France.

Don't forget another point, big stadium+big cities(markets)=big sponsors
Lens=Orange
Marseille= Neuf telecom
Paris= Thomson (Emirates)
Lyon= LG+Renault Trucks (Novotel)

and these are not petty deals ... the smallest one is over 5 million a season already and Lyon has 15M euros of sponsorship per season

Metropolitan : I think Sponsors come for a period of time. then they leave they have a plan and then they head out. Even if it turned out to be a nightmare Khalifa said it would bring 10M + to OM... Thomson was there for three season and still be if supporters didnot have such a bad image.... Renault Trucks has been with ol for nearly five years. I won't mention Orange (ex Ola and Lens) almost ten years now.

I am not keen on sponsors... but even spanish club are now negociating with big corp to get extra money... I don't like Nancy's shirt nor Bastia or even Lyon... I Think one main sponsor is enough and that you need to integrate it with style (you choose the perfect picture Nancy is doing it all wrong and these are all petty contract but they need it)

I love Barca and Atletic Bilbao they have an incredible fanbase... San Mames and Camp Nou allow them to not require sponsorship (even if Barca has been in pretty serious talk with Betandwin.com Beijing 2008... Bilbao has been reportedly talking to Euskaltel,or so I heard...)
The reason they don't have sponsor on the shirt is that socios don't want it. Barca is owned by it's fans when you have 90000+ fans who have season ticket or buy pretty expensive ticketS for Barcelona games, you listen to what they say...

Real has sponsor: Benq, Manchester has AIG Insurance, Bayern has one Telekom...Juve has (TAMOIL Lybian gas company nobody is judging it)
actually even Barca makes a bit of advertising for its partners: TV3 appears on the left sleeve.

As for french football I think that ligue 1 should do it the same one it's done in the uk or in championsleague one sponsor and that's it... But clubs are going to cry if they can't have more than one sponsors because of the money they would loose and the disatisfaction of eventual sponsor... At the end of the day the club has to make its decision ... you make it slick like Lens or you transform players in human multibranded billboards

Neda Say : Are you sure you were answering to me ? I'm sorry but I fail to see any link between your point and my post. :(

Anyway, a second Parisian club could easily feel up the Stade de France and create a rivalry with the Paris SG. Knowing that the Stade de France is located in Saint-Denis when the Parc des Princes is located in the 16th arrondissement, it could fastly turn out as a rivalry between Paris and the Banlieue.

actually my last post was for Marco ...

As for Aulas he ows a company called Cegid www.cegid.fr which is based in Lyon Cegid was never a main sponsor but for a long times Cegid logo appeared in the empty area behind the corners... Cegid was a small company and is now a european monster with more than 1500 employees.

In addition O2 is a proud sponsor of Arsenal...Even the Sevilla had Stevenson on its shirt... during the UEFA Cup Final

My turn to do some advertisement if you want to know who does what in sports marketing here is a good website not www.sportstrategies.com it's in french but I think you won't have any problem with that. it's a pay per view website with some free informations and you can browse title to get a glympse of what's the last rumor on the big deals in sports.

Just so you know even pro american league are now talking about allowing big corp to do shirt advertising... they 're not there yet but they are thinking... Football-soccer, is an industry of entertainment just as big brother and soon rugby will follow the same path... Stade Francais played in sdf to please it's fan, they made a huge bunch of euros by the same occasion. Stade Toulousain plays european and top championship games in Stadium Municipal because hey 36000 x 10 euros (price volontarly inacurate) represents what 360000 euros on one game while playing at ernest vallon for the same price 18000x 10... Imagine Marseille against Ajaccio a 60000 seater against a 10000 at let's say 15 euros for every ticket...

France's best manager

http://i4.tinypic.com/zwalaf.jpg

Don't complain about Le Guen yet he has 3 ligue 1 championship under is belt...

Who's complaining?

Amazing Bordeaux will upgrade some parts of his stadium this year...

... the pitch will be changed over the summer for the rwc 2007 taking place next year

Lescure is great for rugby.

I thing all those upgrade will be minium as the stadium is monument classified.

Barcelone is the opposite of most other club cause they don't need money, sponsors, to attract more fans or to have a bigger/more confortable stadium.

the futur of a footbal club resolve in financial health, a good team and a top noch stadium.

A second Ligue 1 club in PAris? people talk about it for years.
It's sure the rivalry PSG/POC (paris other club) would fill the stade de france for one match but it would take YEARS to have POC having more than an half empty stadium at every other game of the season.
SDF is expensive to use, remeber....

The Stad de France looked primarily like a Rugby venue last night. The distance between the goals and the spectator stands behind them was too great for this stadium to be considered world leading.

Was there perhaps temporary seating not in place, or is hosting football not a priority for this stadium?
eg
1. Rugby
2. Athletics
3. Football

SDF is a national stadium wisely made to host various event.
Of course, as football and rugby being the most popular "stadium sports", the building is mainly made for them but it can host athletics without downing the seating so we must regard it as a complete and almost perfect multisports venue.

Paris has enough with PSG. Please don't create a copycat of this trouble maker. A Paris/Banlieue rivalry would be create terrible violence as banlieues's people DON'T want to be called parisian. Ii would create violence on football games like bruxelle 85
Whatever, a POC could not fill the SDF exept for games against marseille, lyon and of course PSG.

Uncle Chop shop :
There is no temporary or removable seats in the SDF.
To convert the place from football to athetics, the lower tiers stand step back slighly (thanks to hydrolic engine), it leaves free the 5/10 meters necessary for the track.

I like SDF for rugby games it's great for track and field perfect for football... even national team not so great... maybe because most of the guys going to these games are dressed in suites and don't really chear most of the time...

Red Star would be I think the only club with a real identity able to fill a third of the seat... But this is not England... a second team would not survive. we had Matra Racing and PSG 20 years ago... Matra thrived then disapeared and PSG took over after struggling madly in his first seasons... basically untill Canal+ took over. There is just no rooms in Paris for a second club... I am not opposed to a club in the suburbs but they will need a strong identity to avoid french banlieu fancy riots before each game
Red Star almost manage to reach ligue 1 many years ago but now they play in what ? 9 th division

Except for the stadium already mentioned here is a list of the stadium of ligue 1 and 2 which, from my point of view, would need to be
a) destroyed and rebuid: Ajaccio, Valencienne (it will be), Laval, Geugnon (in progress) Guingamp, Bastia
b) refurbished: Auxerre, Nancy, Creteil
c) expanded : Nantes, Bastia, Metz, Chateauroux...
give me your point of view.

Well personally I think Creteil will move up next season, that would be great.
In other news, I just read in lequipe.fr that Nice is considering an artificial turf for their stadium

You're right neda say. Most of the stadiums of france should be renovated/rebuilt.

Concerning Nantes, I've, long time ago (circa 98 I think), heard about building uncovered stand behind the goal for a gain of 12.000 seats, like the sydney stadium for the olympic games.

Bastia stadium is simply horrible.

Bastia and Ajaccio are little villages. There "stadiums" belong to the amateur championship

there are villages yes but they still play in ligue 1 or 2... if they want to have a fair treatment I think they should improve their stadia... I am not talking 45000 madness if they could just complete what they have it would already be a big improvement...
Actually except for the fact that bastia stadium has never been completed I kind like it but they have to built the south side it's unbelievable that this piece of shit (I'm sorry)
stand are still there... Just to show some respect to the people who died there... they should do something

Nantes idea sounds interesting... I was looking at some pictures and rendering on bordeaux lescure... Couldn't they do what pdp is about to do ... digging and building behing the goal... They have not the same space but there is clearly enough room for something... Surprising about Nice the astro turf... I thought that Sochaux, Lens or Monaco would have one first... But it's not a bad idea an astro turf cost around 250000 euros an old fashion pithc the same but you have to change it regularly... so not a bad idea at all

3tmk ! By creteil moving up what do you mean... ligue 1?

No Bordeaux can't.
There's no place left on the sides of the pitch :

http://img193.imageshack.us/img193/8039/lescureplan6cs.gif (http://imageshack.us)

3tmk ! By creteil moving up what do you mean... ligue 1?
Yes, they aren't the best team, but I think they can do it in the next few years.
At most they'll be one of those elevator teams, coming up just to come down, but it would be interesting to see a second IdF team for even a season

Well, Creteil in Ligue 1, interesting idea... But Ducvauchelle will need serious overhaul to be viable... I really don't know if it's possible to have two "parisian club" in ligue 1

We had Racing and PSG once but now... all different story, I which them all the best anyway... I would have really enjoyed Red Star in Ligue 1 so why not Creteil.

What about lowering the pitch just a bit and just extending the stands behind the goals?!

Some new Stadionwelt pics from Neuchatel

http://www.stadionwelt.de/stadionwelt_stadien/images/news/neuchatel_220506_04.jpg
http://www.stadionwelt.de/stadionwelt_stadien/images/news/neuchatel_220506_03.jpg

Neufchatel is building a great little stadium... But what is it doing in this thread... Switzerland championcship is also on the rise and it would deserve a thread of it's own

NEDA SAY about bordeaux :
You're right, Rebuilding the stands behind the goal is the better option.
Concerning the lowering of the pitch, i don't think there's enough place beside the field to even if it is from 1 meter.
If the angle of the stand is (let's say) 33%, digging 1 meter would mean the stand would be 3 meters colser to the pitch and with the actual poor distance, it would break the security rules cos' I think it would be damn too close to the sideline if it don't enter the pitch surface.
What to do think?

I don't know why, but I like the stands behind the goal (a little flat, so that is why I do not know why,) It is unique I guess. Just put an extra tire on the whole stadium and blow it up, jajaja! :cheers:

well I think you're right with security rules it can't be done... but there's still a lot of space behind the goald they can do something there maybe and extra 6000 seats if they reshape these zones so that would put Lescure at about 4200 (I still can't say chaban delmas) add more seat at the back would make the stand even flatter than they are now on the lower side.

From what I've heard the pitchview in lescure (me too I never say chaban delmas) is not great on the lower seats.
The same thing applied to olympia stadion in Munich but there, the bayern could afford to block few ranges of seats, bordeaux can't.

would you have som pics of lescure mine are so crappy I can't get anything from it?!

Here's what I have, no much.

http://img193.imageshack.us/img193/6448/bordeaux0lj.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

http://img193.imageshack.us/img193/8903/lescbmp6am.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

http://img193.imageshack.us/img193/6324/lescurebmp3dh.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

http://img193.imageshack.us/img193/1218/lescurevudehaut5qb.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

http://img193.imageshack.us/img193/1706/stlescur6ph.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

If you have pix of the stade de france rejected projects, I would be very pleased to have them. thank you.

Great pics, thanks, sorry where I am, I don't have any picture. I am browsing the web all the time to get info
Concerning lescure improving seating will probably require to keep nohing else but the outside and roof superstructrure... and rebuild from the ground up both cop.

If there's one thing I don't see in the future, it's bordeaux spending money on a new stadium... If owners want to improve seating capacity they will have to raise money themselve.

However sidelines look real tight as you said behind goals are wide just enough.
My point is improving lescure seating will be a lot more expensive than PDP. Maybe 4000 extra seats with the best architect there is having a very steep higher stand and an extremely flat lower part... With a goal lines less then tree meters away from the fan. Fans would probably like it security specialist will hate it... DIstrict authority would be likely to say no. this expension would be a lot more expensive than pdp just because of all demolition work you would have to take care of before you even start... You can't blow anything up since Lescure is a monument. One crazy plan would be to raise the roof to the main stand heights... But I think that the roof itself is a monument due to its very particular and beatiful shaping.
I don't see this happening unless some crazy football crazy bordelais wants to waste 40M for an extra 4000 puting Lescure to just 40000... They would still be way behind Lyon, Marseille, Lens and Paris...

overall, the bordeaux stadium is a classic stadium by french standarts.

I personnally don't think it is very beautiful but it has its caché.

No way to improve the capcity in my mind.

Bordeaux will have to make with what they have until they have the money to build a new stadium, wich is not for soon.

Too bad bez and chaban delmas 100.000 stadium project in the mid 80's never escaped the paper.

That was a ludicrous project... Besides if you want to buy a piece of land today in the greater bordeaux area be my guest... It would cost a fortune. Bordeaux never had the popultation to build such a thing and will probably never had... But I recognize Claude Bez silly touch... Second point bordeaux doesn't really have the local corporate support that Lyon enjoys...

Of course it was en egomaniac idea but, as long as it is not my money at stake, it should have been fun.

A big, topnotch state of the art stadium always attract people although I admit it should have been sad and bad looking on TV to always have a 3/4 empty stadium but

Hey anybody anynews coming from the lille metropole stadium?
I think we can just stop dreaming of improving Lescure it's a dead end
Lille new stadium is more relevant to me

Yes, if you have something new about lille stadium, let's talk about it for sure.

The situation with lille stadium starts to piss me off.
One day it's ok and the next morning it's not...
I'm fed up with that.

If Lille metropole was clever they would make a clone of sdf without the third ring capacity 50000 with the track ideal for both the club and the meeting end of the story tear down the actual stadium built a new one on it 3 years of work and that's it

No need to get all pissed off it's useless nothing in your power unless...

Hey here's the new date of delivery for Lille new stadium summer 2009

Summer 2009?
So it's time to rush.
Do they finally have a written project or is everything yet to be though about?

The location is still scheduled to be the actual stadium grimonpres-jooris?

No new location is Villeneuve d'asq Parc... next to the actual stadium or on the actual site ... no architect mentioned so far... I think it's going to be a "hok" stadium since the delay is relay short. So far no rezonning area has been mentioned.
right now the losc is focussing on Luchin training facility which should be completed by summer 2007

hey I was ready l'equipe on the web today and I found this: it apears to be Seydoux wish list for its new Villeneuve d'Asq stadium : (in french)

la communauté urbaine de Lille (LMCU) définira au mois d'octobre le cahier des charges. Nous aurons alors une meilleure vision, tout comme les collectivités, des délais de construction. Il est évident que, quand on veut bâtir un stade, on s'inspire de ce qui se fait le mieux. Notre ambition, c'est de construire un stade cinq étoiles selon les critères de l'UEFA. C'est-à-dire qu'il pourrait accueillir une finale de Ligue des Champions. Ce n'est pas démesuré par rapport à la taille de la métropole lilloise et à son potentiel. Il faudra également tenir compte des conditions climatiques. Le fait qu'il soit couvert, comme l'Arena d'Amsterdam, une enceinte proche de chez nous, nous paraît important, en particulier pour l'exploitation des équipements hors football.

One word: Ambitious

ils ont pas peté les plombs là??????

5 star stadium (50.000 minimum....) with retractable roof?????

for a city like Lille, it's okay but due to french football situation...
oh I'm lost.....

Maybe he did but hey... for another two years lille is going to get a nice check from lfp and Canal+... enough to compensate for the only 17000 seats plus if lucky they will play in lens for Championsleague ... 3 games sold out 42000 seat 20 euros a ticket minimum good deal.

Half of the stadium is to be financed by Lille Metropole... another by private investment... I 'd rather have a city saying that they want to welcome a championsleague final and puting the money in it than a Nice way of doing things.
At least they have guts
Go Losc Go

Besides I think that a roofed stadium is the best option lille has to build a convention center for cheap ... the stadium would be a pretty busy place not relying only on soccer games to make money ... wise call

Hum quite disturbing news Olivier Sadran TOULOUSE FC owner/chairman declared today that he was planning a new stadium within five to six years...
Knowing that toulouse already have a very descent 36000 seater. What is he thinking?
Toulouse is a booming still the club struggles to be consistent.

I have nothing against it though... Toulouse would have a huge stadia
with ernest wallon 18000 seats, stadium municipal 36000 and this new stadium obvisouly bigger. knowing that it's useless to build a stadium which 25 % bigger this stadium would have a good 50000 seats.

I was hoping for a deck all around the stadium ... A new stadium instead why not after all

Folie des grandeur?

I don't know what to think about toulouse....
Le stadium is a beautiful stadium and large enough for toulouse.

Not necessary to expand I think.

I would love toulouse to have a 50.000 seats stadium but it's not worth the price.

Perhaps every ligue 1 team will have its 50.000 seats stadium when lyon will finally start building its own....

Yes it's true that the away team are never filling up the seat ... But unfortunately France is a little bigger than Holland and England... And our fans are just not sold on going to some games 700 km away... Especially in some stadiums i.e Lille, Strasbourg, Auxerre, Ajaccio, Nice, Metz are either too distant from most other city or have really crapy stadiums the palm goes to Ajaccio once again... 8000 seats unfinished and you have to take the Ferry or the plane to get there... Nice will have a brand new stadium within 3 years...Lille will wait probably a bit longer... Strasbourg's stadium needs a complete make over... From my point of view Marseille has a great stadium but when it rains ... Paris my dear hometown, has a good stadium, but terrible fans and uncommital ownership... Lens have the best crowd but the club doesn't have the same money than before... Toulouse and Rennes are getting there with 35000 seats available and pretty much no public yet ... Lyon has a 41000 seats stadium and has to drop 2000 seats to the away team for each home game ...make the count yourself it make 39000... Lyon are selling out most of their game but just like in Italie or Spain some teams aren't attractive enough for the people to get to Gerland...we don't have the same great fanatic attitude than you guys


False false and archi false

Auxerre-Troyes 60km
Metz-nancy-50 km
Nice-Monaco 18km
Lille-Lens 25km

the distant is small, you're bad in geography


For information Auxerre Stadium (Abbé Deschamps Stadium) have a capacity of 23 400 seats (and no 20 000) the Tennis Stand will be built in 3 our 4 years for a future capacity of 30,000 seats. It's suffisant for a small city like auxerre.

Auxerre is the only club proprietary of his stadium in feench league.



http://img183.imageshack.us/img183/7372/auxerrestadeabbdeschamps28qk1.jpg

http://img312.imageshack.us/img312/2765/auxerrestadeabbdeschamps4tr4.jpg

http://img333.imageshack.us/img333/1276/auxerrestadeabbdeschamps2ly5.jpg

http://img333.imageshack.us/img333/5807/auxerrestadeabbdeschamps1gy2.jpg

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http://img312.imageshack.us/img312/6510/auxerrestadeabbdeschamps12dc7.jpg

http://img424.imageshack.us/img424/152/auxerrestadeabbdeschamps13gv8.jpg

http://img424.imageshack.us/img424/1460/auxerrestadeabbdeschamps15yr1.jpg

http://img312.imageshack.us/img312/7997/auxerrestadeabbdeschamps16qi6.jpg

http://img406.imageshack.us/img406/5828/auxerrestadeabbdeschamps17kr0.jpg
http://img486.imageshack.us/img486/1014/auxerrestadeabbdeschamps18jf6.jpg

http://img486.imageshack.us/img486/250/auxerrestadeabbdeschamps19yk6.jpg

http://img312.imageshack.us/img312/9782/auxerrestadeabbdeschamps26xe8.jpg

http://img312.imageshack.us/img312/6555/auxerrestadeabbdeschamps27aq7.jpg

http://img322.imageshack.us/img322/3937/auxerrestadeabbdeschamps29cb9.jpg

The small stand is tennis stand, the stand will be built with loges and maybe restaurant. Actually the club built near the stadium the administration center of the club, a "boutique".

We will have Big TV in the stadium to see the score, the time etc.... and actually we have new publicitary system near the grass

A nice stadium for a nice club and a nice city

I am against the principle of having seats reserved for the visiting team, unless it is proven that they will be utilized. Most of the time, they are empty.

Hum quite disturbing news Olivier Sadran TOULOUSE FC owner/chairman declared today that he was planning a new stadium within five to six years...

The problem in Toulouse is the rugby. A 36000-seater is more than enough for Toulouse but he probably wants a dedicated stadium

I think its about time that a propper 60k stadium is being built in France.
Even when the attendance figures are not so high.

Yes checker but:

the only teams which could fill it are :
marseille (it's stadium is already 60k)
paris
lens
nantes
lyon
Lille

But which city can afford it financially?

lyon can (but now values more confort and rentability than a huge capacity so expext a 55k dome rather than the 70k basic stadium wanted from the start by aulas)

Paris can (but is home at 48k parc des princes and will never move to a new stadium. From what we now, the maximum expansion that could be made is 54k)

Marseille can (but it needs to build a real TEAM before expanding its ugly, windy, uncovered and out of credibility stadium to 80.000)

I thought Lens wanted to expand Bollaert?

If they "closed" the corners, how many seats would be added? 5000? Maybe a little more?

when you know martel, you can sure that the corner will be high-trubune for large seats.....i will say 5 000 because in a corner there are pc security only three corner are free...

lyon can (but now values more confort and rentability than a huge capacity so expext a 55k dome rather than the 70k basic stadium wanted from the start by aulas)

Well that sounds good.
A 55k dome would be great.
Are the plans for a new stadium in Lens very advanced? When could they start with construction?

Right now, Lens is forseeing the futur of the club with a huge improve of its stadium.
But MArtel want shops, restaurant and an upgrade in comfort at the top priority.

In it's actual configuration, the corner would be really difficult to fill because of difference of heigth and deepth of the stands :

http://img520.imageshack.us/img520/39/lensstadxj4.th.jpg (http://img520.imageshack.us/my.php?image=lensstadxj4.jpg)

http://img107.imageshack.us/img107/2885/nowplens1psa6.th.gif (http://img107.imageshack.us/my.php?image=nowplens1psa6.gif)

There is also a railway problem as you can see on the first pics.

I don't think there are any advanced plans for Lens. It would probably be much easier for them if Lille was still in second league.

Thx for the info.
So I guess Itll still take them a bit until a new stadium can be built.

Hey guys just came back from vacation and just wanted to say that lens is not to build corners to improve the seating capacity. They have a more simple way to do it. they just going to overhaul their oldest stand. If you look at Vilak pictures you can see that the north stand isn't as high as the others. They are going to rebuild or just have a second level. And there you go with an extra 6000 seats for a second floor or a brand new stand with at least a 12000 seat capacity. NICE AND EASY

Lens cant build four corners cause of the highway on one side rails on another one besides corner means more work to have the stand to be interconnected you need them to be leveled a bit which can prove tricky.

I don't think there are any advanced plans for Lens. It would probably be much easier for them if Lille was still in second league.


There are plans, thanks o the Louvre Lens. However nothing will happen before rugby world cup.

Just to answer spanish gabacho

alse false and archi false
Auxerre-Troyes 60km
Metz-nancy-50 km
Nice-Monaco 18km
Lille-Lens 25km

the distance is small, you're bad in geography

I migth suck at geography however Paris, Marseille, Lens, Lyon, Bordeaux, Monaco Toulouse are not so close from each other... You can't say that you are taking your car for a 7 hours roadtrip just like you'd hop in your car for a 10 minutes drive.
The point is; I am not in favor of having a ridiculous number of seats reserved for fan from the visiting team. I 'm not against them travelling with their team. I am against having 2000 almost empty cause the visitors fan club was not able to send peoble down. the rule is just idiotic I better have a full stadium cheering is club than a 92% full stadium it just represents a waste of time and money.
I have nothing against smaller clubs, especially not Auxerre but the championship is more than four miscalled "derby" games

it's seems a lot of expansions will be made AFTER the rugby world cup nut nothing had been done FOR the world cup.

but future looks bright :
parc des princes 54.000
velodrome 80.000
lyon 55/70.000
lens 50.000
lille 50.000
nice 32/40.000
toulouse 45/50.000

yes, it should be great if all those things happens

I' ll be sad to see toulouse stadium unused though it's one of the greates stadium this country has. It can't be demolish which is a good thing I guess stade Toulousain could have it full on a lot of games ... But then what about Ernest Wallon.

I have to point that some rugby club too are starting to think in their stadium
Toulouse has a 19000 seater
Clermont has a 20000 seater which they are expanding as we speak.
Montpellier is getting a brand new 12000 seater. I heard it might expand to 17000
Paris will have a 20000 seater before 2012. On the Jean Bouin site!!!!
Biarritz disapointed me with just another stand. I don't think aguilera exceeds 10000 right now.
Perpignan made the best the could do and are now having a 12000 seater
Too bad these cities are the only big cities able to pay for new stadia

I hope pro indoor sport teams will one day have the same treatment. I had a look at the 2007 handball world cup in Germany I am dead jealous.

I stand corrected on Biarritz Aguilera Stadium capcity appears to be 13500. No precision on the number of actual seats though.

I' ll be sad to see toulouse stadium unused though it's one of the greates stadium this country has. It can't be demolish which is a good thing I guess stade Toulousain could have it full on a lot of games ... But then what about Ernest Wallon.

I have to point that some rugby club too are starting to think in their stadium
Toulouse has a 19000 seater
Clermont has a 20000 seater which they are expanding as we speak.
Montpellier is getting a brand new 12000 seater. I heard it might expand to 17000
Paris will have a 20000 seater before 2012. On the Jean Bouin site!!!!
Biarritz disapointed me with just another stand. I don't think aguilera exceeds 10000 right now.
Perpignan made the best the could do and are now having a 12000 seater
Too bad these cities are the only big cities able to pay for new stadia


Colombes: there is a project to rebuilt the Yves du Manoir stadium, 15000/20000 seats ...

France is a country where there is a lot of talk.

I think we should focuse on projects that have chance to become reality in the near future.

I'm really disturbed that aulas has not yes presented some project so we could have pix of what he really wants and what he really think is the future stadiuum of its team.

there's no possibility to rush the process. We all have to wait till the city choose the spot on which the new stadium is to build. they 're down to two sites now and the response should be given this fall. I Think Aulas architects team need to evaluate the surronding before the unveil the design. I think this stadium will be areality by 2010

Hey. I found news regarding Lille stadia : Villeneuve d'Asq will receive a new roof covering the stadium stand integrally, giant screen, luxury and corporate suites. the capacity might decrease a little bit because of the suites but all in all more comfort for the fans. The city will spend 15 M euros on it.
Some information regarding design and construction of the football dedicated new stadium are also available

Picture available here:
[URL=http://www.lillemetropole.fr/index.php?p=71&p=27&art_id=11933]

Funny they choose the design of the Beijing 2008 olympic stadium as an illustration.

Great link and great infos!

So the grand stade de Lille had finally found its location.

For Lyon, I think it's time to decide what to do....

If they are to start in 2008 in Lille, they should not finish before late 2009 or early 2010.
I like Villeneuve d'asq new roof very classy from the sky. The cost of improvement in two years they spent roughly 21 M ... When you know that Caen, Sochaux spent the same kiind of money having a new stadium!

Focussing on league 1 we permanenetly oversee the project of some league two clubs.
Reims is getting a 22000 seater info available at :
http://www.stade-de-reims.com/index.php?p=stade

Le Havre has a plan well advanced on a 30000+ seater 3-4_stade.jpg

you can go check it out on http://www.infoceane.com/hac/nouveau-stade/index.html

if you speak french you can download the pdf file it's really well done. My only problem with and I am really just pickie: it's a HOK project even if this time the design look to be different from their last stadium.

In theorie Bastia and Ajaccio have to upgrade their stadium before the end of the 2007-08 season ... All examption will come to and end by then. I'd like to see Furiani completed

The second and last link don't work at the time I write this message.

Great news anyway for those two cities.

sorry about the second link it's obviously broken but you can just check it out very easily on the HAC website

sorry about the second link it's obviously broken but you can just check it out very easily on the HAC website

The city of Grenoble in the South-East of France is developing a new stadium. The modern facility which will provide a venue for football, rugby and other kinds of large-scale events will have a covered seating capacity of 20,000. It is built in the place of the previous and old stadium "Charles Berty"

This new stadium will be used by the football second league team of Grenoble (GF38 (http://www.grenoblefoot38.fr/)).
If needed the capacity of the stadium can be increased to 28,000 seats.

It will be finished in November 2007.

http://www.la-metro.org/fr/images/actualite/stade/stade1.jpg

http://img135.imageshack.us/img135/5083/stade2ce8.jpg

http://img91.imageshack.us/img91/7447/stade3ja1.jpg

http://img91.imageshack.us/img91/6392/stade1vb0.jpg

http://www.la-metro.org/fr/images/actualite/stade/stade4.jpg

http://www.la-metro.org/fr/images/stade/stade_p2_p3.jpg

With the extension:
http://www.la-metro.org/fr/images/actualite/stade/stade2.jpg

http://www.la-metro.org/fr/images/travaux/schema_coupe_stade.jpg


The old stadium "Charles Berty" built in 1936:
http://stades17.free.fr/france%201/grenoble1.jpg
http://rernes.free.fr/images/france/grenoble/grenoble -tribune honneur.jpg

For the moment the GF38 (football team) and the FCG (rugby team) use the "Stade Lesdiguieres" (14,000 seats):
http://rernes.free.fr/images/france/grenoble/grenoble.jpg
http://img178.imageshack.us/img178/2497/vuepanoramiquebm2.jpg


The works:
http://www.bauer.de/en/presse/artikel/images/grenoble_frankreich_b.jpg
http://www.la-metro.org/fr/images/travaux/le-niveau-1.jpg
http://www.la-metro.org/fr/images/travaux/chantier-global.jpg

Grenoble is a beautiful place, the drive down through the Alps is great, and once you get there, the scenery is gorgeous. It has a great train station as well....

good to see this stadium is finally happening

Nice new stadium, not bad!

http://img178.imageshack.us/img178/2497/vuepanoramiquebm2.jpg

That hardly seems like a fair contest, when one team has 23 players and the other only has 21 :)

That stadium is the clone of the Amiens stadium's for a city like Grenoble it's nice but hopefully they will upgrade it one day at 30000 there's no way 20000 is enough to get to Ligue 1 (League 1) these days

This ranking is a "collector" :cucumber: :banana: :pepper:

http://img241.imageshack.us/img241/6954/classementligue2yf2.jpg

Ready to play, next year, in the First French League ? I hope it's not only a dream...

thats great!! this stadium was the oppening ceremony of olympics realised?

thats great!! this stadium was the oppening ceremony of olympics realised?

What do you mean ? Are you asking if the old stadium "Charles Berty" was the place where the opening ceremony of the X Olympic Winter Games took place in 1968 ?

In that case, no !

The opening ceremony took place in the South of the city at the old airport (destroyed) thanks to a temporary structure of 60,000 seats.

The temporary structure of the Inaugural Stadium:
http://www.olympic.org/upload/games/1968W_city.gif

The arrival of the Olympic Flag:
http://multimedia.olympic.org/pic/gal1968w_l_03.jpg

The last carrier (Alain Calmat) of the Olympique flame:
http://multimedia.olympic.org/pic/gal1968w_l_01.jpg

The Olympic Flame burns in the cauldron:
http://multimedia.olympic.org/pic/gal1968w_l_02.jpg

The volunteers:
http://multimedia.olympic.org/pic/gal1968w_l_07.jpg

The French Patrol:
http://multimedia.olympic.org/pic/gal1968w_l_08.jpg

nice , isn't GF38 not becoming a toy of Japanese investors ?
can you give me the link for the page you posted on Ligue2 s.v.p. ?

yes they are the toys of the Index corporation...Good for them big city they could draw a big crowd if they have the right stadium don't ask me if I like this one...

nice , isn't GF38 not becoming a toy of Japanese investors ?
Yes it can be a problem.
When the new Japanese president of the GF38 came the first time in Grenoble, he said "Grenoble will win the Champion's league in the 5 years' time" !! With this kind of talks we can't say that he knows a lot about football... I hope I'm wrong.
Moreover it's also true when you see the story about the Japanese player Masashi Oguro... This player was imposed to the coach last year but he didn't want to come in Grenoble (in his mind it was not enough prestigious). Finally after 6 months he came but he was no more useful because the team was not built around him. So he leaved the club this month and signed with the Torino...
After several months and a lot of errors, Japanese investors (through the president and the manager) let the coach and the technical manager to decide about technical stuffs...
So I think, after this summer, investors have understood if they want to build a big team in Grenoble they have to trust on people who know and don't act like a child with a toy... They became realistic and may be that's why the GF38 has good results today.


can you give me the link for the page you posted on Ligue2 s.v.p. ?

http://www.lfp.fr/ligue2/classement.asp
Be fast, I think this ranking won't be up to date next week... ;)

Pictures of the last week-end:

http://img84.imageshack.us/img84/9149/pict0078gl3.jpg

http://img136.imageshack.us/img136/3893/pict0079ut2.jpg

http://img142.imageshack.us/img142/2050/pict0080cp2.jpg

http://img226.imageshack.us/img226/4848/pict0081vt0.jpg

double post

The stadium and its surroundings:

http://img101.imageshack.us/img101/5669/mistral2parcth4.jpg

What do you mean ? Are you asking if the old stadium "Charles Berty" was the place where the opening ceremony of the X Olympic Winter Games took place in 1968 ?

In that case, no !

The opening ceremony took place in the South of the city at the old airport (destroyed) thanks to a temporary structure of 60,000 seats.

The temporary structure of the Inaugural Stadium:
http://www.olympic.org/upload/games/1968W_city.gif

The arrival of the Olympic Flag:
http://multimedia.olympic.org/pic/gal1968w_l_03.jpg

The last carrier (Alain Calmat) of the Olympique flame:
http://multimedia.olympic.org/pic/gal1968w_l_01.jpg

The Olympic Flame burns in the cauldron:
http://multimedia.olympic.org/pic/gal1968w_l_02.jpg

The volunteers:
http://multimedia.olympic.org/pic/gal1968w_l_07.jpg

The French Patrol:
http://multimedia.olympic.org/pic/gal1968w_l_08.jpg

yes, thanks

I'm not convinced with the stadium but put it in the old olympic cluster is genius... the next step should be to overhaul the Olympic arena and Grenoble would have an awsome stadia...well only after the expansion of the new stadium of course... 20000 in ligue 1 next year not bad but not great either especially with their weird and not so savvy owners. but I sure do like the stadium to be downtown in a Parc near other sports facility, is it far from the hockey arena ?

thank you anyway for the links.

So few things have changed more since the last post.

-Marseille still plan to expand to 80.000 after 2007.
-Lille got green light for it's 50.000 five star retractable roof stadium dream.
-PSG owners now want to expand to 80.000 (rivalry with OM?).
-Lens look for someone to design renovation that would put the stadium to 60.000 and make it a complete business center (shops, shops and shops).

And Lyon fans still hope OL new stadium will be built before the 22nd century.....

When did they say anything about a 80.000 seat stadium for Paris?
I'm a psg fan and follow the day by day news but I don't remember anything about that.

Also, St Etienne has begun a project about a possible 50 to 60k seat stadium, on the grounds of some failed Casino hypermarket headquarters, or to completely destroy the chaudron.
But apparently it's very early, they're basically just looking into it

We'll talk about PDP in it's topic.

concerning ST-Etienne, it would make fan upset to leave the chaudron.
I think a rebuilt of the stadium stand by stand (a la velodrome) should make everybody happy.

As a PSG fan, you must think that PSg is home at PDP and perhaps was against a moving to SDF.
That's surely the same thing with ASSE fans, they feel home at guichard and a moving to a new stadium would upset most of them by breaking with history.

60.000 seems a little bit to much for a team like st etienne.
Of course they have a big support but 60.000 would be really hard to fullfill.
I know that if you look at what happen with topnoch stadiums built recently,
a beautiful and comfortable stadium is a tool necessary now to make great teams.

What?! 80000 people in Pdp! Wait a minute, where was I? are they freakin insane! Paris-Marseille rivalry!? What does it have to do with it?

Parc des princes has always been smaller than Velodrome, PSG not as "prestigious" as OM. Are they kiding us, they are stupid enough to do it and that would make two way too big stadium in Paris... Paris is no London. There's no way both stadium could be sustainable in the long term... PSG is struggling to fil the stadium up on most games, they play european games every now and then... and 80000 it's just a number to get UEFA 6 star ranking. Ridiculous!!!!

I hear some politicians in lille were not so assertive regarding the capacity of the future stadium... Lens going for 60... 55 would be more than enough but it's just my point of view. Saint Etienne destroying the chaudron! Sorry I won't be sad about that. Nice stadium is still blocked ... Are we serious about making new stadium in this country or is it just a joke cause locals election are coming in 2008 or 2009.

You are pointing interesting views neda say.
I didn't though about politics, it may have something to do...

Absolutly, not a lot of team really need to upgrade the capacity of their stadium, they should concentrate on comfort.

the chaudron has an history, it's a centerpiece of the city. To see it detroyed would be sad.

Which teams really have enough money to built new stadium other that marseille or lyon?

I'm not so sure Marseille can find the money... Of course RLD can just pay up front but really what would it worth ; a 80000 giant never at full capacity if the team keeps having poor performances. Lens could take a huge debt and get is old stand rebuild but is it worth taking a risk that big. The stadium is 42000 they want it 60000. the city is only 16000 and the district not even 200000 people. Stuck between Lille and Valencienne. both cities sucking a bit of RCL fanbase without a doubt.

The bill on clubs going public passed today and it's really time to be scared. Other than OL I don't see anyone and I mean anyone having what it takes to be able to go on the market and not bust within a year. I don't think Aulas is in a hurry to get his new stadium we are eager to see it but honestly he does have a 41000 seater even small it's still confortable more than Highbury was.
OL franchises generates good money and they've finished three or four financial exercises in the positive column ... No other club did that in france before in the last 10 years.
Not Lille although doing rather good! Not Lens, nor Nantes, Bordeaux, and even less PSG, OM and ASM.

The two cities who really stadium are Nice and Lille and none of them is getting it ... Lille is apparently getting a stadium which features still remain unknown although it's been two years since Grimonprez-Joris II ate the dust.
Nice is having Idon't know what kind off doubt saying that the deal with carri spada (the building consortium) might not be legal in the end... In this case they only realised that almost a year after the choice of this consortium and surprizingly it's not a judge who realised it but the local prefect!

Really all this stadium frenzy is partly due to the huge impact of the last world cup. Germany showed us the way it was done in terms of stadium while we over spent on one new stadium in 1998 and underspent on the others.

Believe me if you wish, the time is playing on Aulas sides... Marseille and Bordeaux or Paris are never going to catch up.New stadium or not ... In the end this is what it's all about right winning the championship to get money from sponsors and champions league ranking to build a return on investment. So far the only team able to pull it out consistently is Lyon.

My pick they are winning it again this year they go on the market by season end if the situation is good (i.e a championship and possibly reaching the semis in champion'sleague) at that moment Aulas can ask for the price he wants on the market he should get aroung 90-100 000 000 euros and with that he should have LG or Accor paying another 80 for naming rights plus the city and district both going only 25, this is 200 right there! Oh wait a sec I forgot the private equity company and here is another 100 which makes 300! Weird that's what France paid to get the SDF. And guess what it would not cost a thing to Aulas if they can pull it that way.

ps: Emirates paid a premium 160 for arsenal stadium to bear is name. Lyon is not yet at arsenal level, that's why I'm saying only 80, please also note that I'm leaving the region out of the deal too.

It's so big and so easy it's not even funny

3tmk I have a request but I don't know if you have anyway to pull it
I know you're on the superpolis thread and I wondered a bit if you could do a rendering using your skills for the future Stade LG or Accor Parc located nearby Lyon.

If anyone else can be my guest.

Here's the deal, use a simple baseframe like emirates stadium and a skyscraper to try to get an idea or dream should I say of this new facility

What do we know about it? well it should be something like that
55000 seater, conference center, hotel and restaurant, oh yes the probably biggest bunch of flat screens you've ever seen on either side of the Rhone.

good luck

Official news
that's it decision has been made official on the new Lille grand stadium. Finally!!

the result is a 50000 seater arena and not it's not a stadium but really an arena with retractable roof multipurpose (will they dare artificial turf)
cost and that's the important part 230 yes only 230 000 000 for a 50000 seater with a showroof. 4600 euros per seat. it's a good deal

But don't get to hasty this stadium still has to pass a vote which will only take place on november 17.

Interesting fact: the club would have to pay 3M over the next 30 years i.e 90 000 000. The stadium relying on public and private funding ... Logically private equity would commit around 100-120 so if the club sign for 90 what's left to pay for the city????

thank you anyway for the links.

So few things have changed more since the last post.

-Marseille still plan to expand to 80.000 after 2007.
-Lille got green light for it's 50.000 five star retractable roof stadium dream.
-PSG owners now want to expand to 80.000 (rivalry with OM?).
-Lens look for someone to design renovation that would put the stadium to 60.000 and make it a complete business center (shops, shops and shops).

And Lyon fans still hope OL new stadium will be built before the 22nd century.....

Why couldn't they have sorted out all these expansions before the Rugby World Cup? :(

Cause they're a big bunch of idiots or because they just don't care about rugby. None of the expansion is due to the rwc they're only wanted by football teams
who just don't care about rugby.

Yes CharlieP, it's sad WCR will happen in the current landscape.
no effort had been made for this event.
Perhaps because the frenzie of stadium started to late to make it before the cup...
but I join neda say and say that also has to do with the fact politics don't believe in rugby as much as they believe in football.

Yes I heard in telefoot today that lille project is concrete.

-PSG owners now want to expand to 80.000 (rivalry with OM?).

Expending PdP up to 80k is not possible without destroying several building and even the peripherique. If PSG owner want to play in a 80 k stadium, they can use SdF.

Eomer on that I agree 200% and if they still don't want to play in the SDF Then the best they could unludicrouly get is the 54000 seater expansion that already makes PDP a 5 star.

The problem with rugby is that it's not a national sport, it's a regional sport over then Stade Français Paris there's no other club out of a south west lane going from Biarritz to Montpellier.

Not to mention that they're should be a lot more empty seat on that even and that some awsome games will be played in Wales and Scotland and not on the mainland.

concerning parc des princes, Eomer, I will answer in it's own topic.

In France Rugby is indeed a not so much popular sport.
Only big matches can attract enough people to fill a stadium (like past sunday where 80.000 packed in the SDF. Thanx to Canal+ which made it a fiesta with pre-match and post-match attractions) and Big matches happen once or twice a year.

When I look at twickenham or murrayfield, I think we're definitly not a Rugby country.

The problem with rugby is that it's not a national sport, it's a regional sport over then Stade Français Paris there's no other club out of a south west lane going from Biarritz to Montpellier.

Thanks for Clermont-Auvergne (ex Montferrand), Bègles-Bordeaux, Brive, Grenoble, Bourgoin...

If PSG want to expend PdP to 54 k: there will be no problem. But 80 k is definitly not possible. And I'm not shure that having two 5 stars stadium in Paris is necessary: SdF will allway be more usefull for big matchs than PdP.

And PSG is nothing without Dhorasoo...

That's why I said lane not line and the only, top 14, my lane forgot was Bourgoin. All I meant to say is that rugby is not yet big enough of a game to have capacity increase in stadium... Especially with the format chosen for this rwc.

I'd like to see pdp improved nicely to 54000 getting the fans closer to the pitch, making it comfy for big time sponsors but other than that Idon't want to see anything happening to the roof.


ps: top 14 rugby teams are expending their stadium to an average of 15000 seats. No big cities involved is not having already a 35000+ seater ready for the rwc.

...is it far from the hockey arena ?

Yes and no... ;)

Let's go back in 1968 to the Olympic Games and the olympics site in the "Parc Paul Mistral".
http://img85.imageshack.us/img85/9516/mistralparccx2.jpg


The "Palais des Sports (http://www.palais-des-sports.com/)" was the main ice rink (12,000 seats) and was called the "Stade de Glace" ("Ice Stadium"). But after the Olympic Games it has been converted into a multi usage stadium (concert, velodrome...) like the POPB in Paris and is no more used as a ice rink.
http://www.worldstadiums.com/stadium_pictures/europe/france/rhone_alpes/grenoble_palais.jpg
http://img90.imageshack.us/img90/1263/stadeglacedo5.jpg
http://multimedia.olympic.org/pic/gal1968w_l_09.jpg


On the other hand, near the "Palais des Sports" there was the training ice rink (up to 3,000 seats) that was used till 2001 by the local ice hockey team: "Les Bruleurs de Loups (http://www.bruleursdeloups.com/). Today it is a multi use stadium (handball, basket-ball, volley-ball...) and is called "Halle Clémenceau".


But the new arena "Pole Sud (http://www.pole-sud.org/ )" ("South Pole" ; 3,500 seats) built in 2001 and composed of 2 ice rinks is quite "far" from the downtown (5km).
http://www.la-metro.org/fr/images/patinoire/pati-eclatepatigrd.jpg
http://www.bruleursdeloups.com/photos/img/Histoire_BDL/Kakemono_DL.jpg

Today the new arena is too small for the ice hockey team because most of the time it is full, so it should be nice if they could increase the capacity to 5,000 seats...

Pictures taken the 14/10/06

http://img80.imageshack.us/img80/1418/pict0104es0.jpg

East stand:
http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/3250/pict0092iq0.jpg
http://img220.imageshack.us/img220/5470/pict0101fw1.jpg
http://img228.imageshack.us/img228/9131/pict0105wy5.jpg

South stand:
http://img147.imageshack.us/img147/1904/pict0094pm7.jpg
http://img132.imageshack.us/img132/2616/pict0098wr4.jpg
http://img226.imageshack.us/img226/9610/pict0108ah2.jpg
http://img97.imageshack.us/img97/1807/pict0109aw8.jpg

Really greats pix!
Thanks a lot for them.
But I don't see how can you expand it to 28.000? You surely will have to destroy the top isn't it?

Yes neda say.
Most of stadium are increased by City/club partnership.
the governement won't care about it until we get football euro 2012.

it's time to have 5/6 50.000+ stadium.
Actually we only have two and if everybody in charge realise the various projects, we could in 6 years have:
SDF (80k)
Paris PDP (54k)
Marseille (60/80k)
Lille (50k)
Lyon (55/70k)
Lens (50/60k)
St etienne (50/60k)
that makes 7.

I can't wait to see pix of last four projects.

where are the pictures of Lille in that case? 50.000? man let me see!

There's no pix for any of those 4 last projects (lens, lille, lyon & st etienne).

What we now for now is that Lille wants a UEFA 5 stars 50.000 seats stadium with a retractable roof.
they know how much money it should cost and they can afford it with various partners they already have found.
All they need now is to receive projects from architects and aval from mayor office.

It's about the same for the 3 other cities. only the capacity and the facility change.

Thinking about it I don't believe that lille is still pretty much a point zero remember that the future ex new stadium should have seen it's first season this year. It's not even funny it's pathetic.

I read on sports24.com the other day that Aulas (OL chairman) wants to have hotel, spa, fitness centre, restaurants superstores, conference rooms for roadshows and move training facility near by ...Bye bye Tola Vologe!

And regarding picture on either Lille lens or lyon Idon't think we're going to see any accurate rendering anytime soon.

Really greats pix!
But I don't see how can you expand it to 28.000? You surely will have to destroy the top isn't it?

No, you don't have to destroy the roof. I don't find any more the picture of the stadium with 28,000 seats but I can tell you it is possible. I think the same strategy as the "Stade de la Licorne" in Amiens will be used (12,000 to 20,000). The new tier will be inserted above the lower stands and will be hung on the frame...

http://www.la-metro.org/fr/images/travaux/schema_coupe_stade.jpg

http://www.la-metro.org/fr/images/metroscope/metroscope-pdf/45-octobre%202005/3-microscope.pdf

That's the very good thing, Vilak : they won't have to destroy the top, they will just unload it and then reload it... This stadium is basically just a bigger stade de la licorne in it's design. The roof is very light sort off. You can undo it properly, lay it on the ground, do what you have to do and put everything back nice and clean.



Very nice pics marco and thanks for the info. I 've always been impressed by the design of the old Palais des sports, I've seen a recent picture of the inside it's huge. The floor is Bigger than the one in Bercy!?

Do you think they're going to increase the cap of Pole sud? Well it would be nice if they want to get the olympics in 2018 for sure!

That's why I said lane not line and the only, top 14, my lane forgot was Bourgoin. All I meant to say is that rugby is not yet big enough of a game to have capacity increase in stadium... Especially with the format chosen for this rwc.

ps: top 14 rugby teams are expending their stadium to an average of 15000 seats. No big cities involved is not having already a 35000+ seater ready for the rwc.

Yes, I understand that there is no need for extra capacity for the Top 14, but my point was that if the soccer clubs want to expand their capacity soon, it is a shame that these expansions are coming too late for the Rugby World Cup. England supporters will fill Stade Geoffroy-Guichard for the first game against the USA, so it's a shame it hasn't been extended yet (or the new Lille stadium built). More people would be able to watch France v Georgia[1] in Marseilles if the expansion was done, and travelling New Zealand fans will probably fill Stade de Gerland. There are plenty of other games that will sell out in stadia not earmarked for expansion (e.g. France v Morocco[2] in Toulouse, England v Samoa in Nantes) that could have been scheduled for larger venues if all the projects on Vilak's list had happened already.

[1] or Portugal or Russia or Spain.
[2] or Namibia.

Yes Neda, Aulas wants everything around the futur stadium.
that's why the 70k stadium he wanted 3/4 years ago is now a 55k arena being the cornerstone of a business center.

Personnally, I'd like much a 70k stadium.

RWC will be huge in France but if we expanded stadiums like nantes just for it, they would have been too big for their club thereafter.

It's sure governement could have participate in the fund of lille and lyon future stadiums at the condition they're ready for RWC but those projects started too late.

Great!

I like thiis new way to built stadium with facilities for future expansion!
It should be the rule!!!!!

Very nice pics marco and thanks for the info. I 've always been impressed by the design of the old Palais des sports, I've seen a recent picture of the inside it's huge. The floor is Bigger than the one in Bercy!?
I don't know, the floor area of the "Palais des Sports" is 12,000 m2...

The problem is the space taken by the track of the velodrome and instead of the POPB, the track is not covered by stands so some seats are lost...


A picture during the World Championship of Petanque
http://www.kentpetanque.org/KentPetanqueAssociation/WC%202002/arena.jpg


A picture of the "Palais des Sports" with the working area of the "Stade d'agglomeration"
http://fr.structurae.de/files/photos/2018/grenoble/gr_palais_des_sports.jpg


Do you think they're going to increase the cap of Pole sud? Well it would be nice if they want to get the olympics in 2018 for sure!
The problem is the money ! With the delays of the new football stadium, the price of the arena has been multiplyed by 2 ! So it will be hard to the "Metro" (metropolitan government structure of Grenoble) to find money... :(

3tmk I have a request but I don't know if you have anyway to pull it
I know you're on the superpolis thread and I wondered a bit if you could do a rendering using your skills for the future Stade LG or Accor Parc located nearby Lyon.

If anyone else can be my guest.

Here's the deal, use a simple baseframe like emirates stadium and a skyscraper to try to get an idea or dream should I say of this new facility

What do we know about it? well it should be something like that
55000 seater, conference center, hotel and restaurant, oh yes the probably biggest bunch of flat screens you've ever seen on either side of the Rhone.

good luck

hehehe, sorry but that's way beyond my league. Plus we deal with simple projects with mspaint, although some of us have tried stadia, if you look around the map you will see them.
Perhaps you could try to open a thread in the 3d section, those guys have real skills

hehehe, sorry but that's way beyond my league. Plus we deal with simple projects with mspaint, although some of us have tried stadia, if you look around the map you will see them.
Perhaps you could try to open a thread in the 3d section, those guys have real skills

Thanks for the tip

I would be ok if Lyon get a 70000... But I said that before; it's good as long as you play big games i.e champions leagues games every year. 55000 seats worth roughly 300 000 000 a for 70000 just add another 100 and you get the figure. These are huge "boats" to finance

The government did not help a single bit for this RWC and I don't remember the french rugby federation asking for expansions. They were just so happy to have this rwc.

I'm in favor of any club/city making improvement to it's stadium I'd like to see Nantes and Toulouse expanded if possible. I sais from the start that rennes did something too small and that Strasbourg should... do something.

Marseille truly doesn't need 80000 seats... It would have been great to have semi finals in a 80000 seater but it's just not going to happen.

You're right Neda say.

Nantes doesn't need to expand as la beaujoire is almost never sold out.
Toulouse can't improve it's stadium a lot as it's classified historic monument and you can't change anything from the outside.
As I previously said , the only possibility is to add a second ring of seat like the astrodome did.

Somebody shoud open a thread on the next rwc stadium and you'll see that most of the stadium used for it are 12 ok stadium but read again I just said 12.
And oh! 20 teams : 12 less than the FWC which did use 12 stadium for 32 teams. Weird that does means less games per stadia but four stadium above 60000 seats, three 40000+ stadium and five 35000+. I really see no reason to complain at all.

Well I do see a reason to complain in fact! It's great to have Cardiff and Edimburgh on the map but. Part of the money spent there will not come back in the safe of the french commitee lol. And if you are a kiwi or an aussie well just get ready for some crazy commuting.

Well I do see a reason to complain in fact! It's great to have Cardiff and Edimburgh on the map but. Part of the money spent there will not come back in the safe of the french commitee lol. And if you are a kiwi or an aussie well just get ready for some crazy commuting.

I agree. The crazy thing is that the FFR didn't need to do these deals with the SRU and WRU at all, since they defeated the RFU's bid easily...

Well it would be contingent to getting the olympics right ! and you can't bid without a part of the infrastructure already in Place so they would have to build a new arena or try to play the history card restoring this old piece of style.

And really no doubt this place is huge just imagine if you remove the track and lower the ground (I don't know if that last thing is possible) it's at least 15000 very comfy seats easy!

Grenoble 1968, Grenoble 2018

Oups that's you line!

Ok, ok, nice talking about rugby guys but let's just open a thread about it!
Back to soccer, I meant football... if Lille, lyon Marseille and Lens are slacking around, Valencienne and Reims are shaping up their stadia.
Here are links to the Valencienne Nungesser II project:
http://www.va-fc.com/club/index.aspx?lng=fr&r=2003
this link will link you to the project page made by Valencienne metro:
http://www.valenciennes-metropole.fr/article1261.html

While that, well Reims is halfway there already :
http://www.stade-de-reims.com/index.php?p=stade
the current look makes me think to a minor league baseball field with just this angle up and the open view

Both are smalls 20-25000 but are looking good. However they won't upgrade easily if necessary. The main features are once again the roofs who are looking great!

Lyon will start the building of its new stadium in early 2007.
60.000 seats
Retractable roof.
Business center (societies).
Commercial Center (shops).
Hostel.
40 hectares global for the "site du Montou".
site located at Decines, on Lyon cityside, about 10 kilometers form Lyon's heart.
Architect: Hok sports (emirates stadium, new Wembley, sydney olympic, millenium in cardiff)
finished for 2010/11 or 2011/12 season opening game.
cost : 500 Millions €. (Lyon's owner have the money and is willing to spend it for the project)
no pix, simulation or model avalaible.
What's sure is that it will looks exactly like Emirates stadium with a retractable roof.

So finally it's a 60000, good for them, a bit too far from downtown for me but I guess it will be an occasion to get some new bus lines from city to suburbs
500 M, they really want to be no match for any other teams of L1

500 millions is for the whole complex, not just the stadium but you are right about Aulas ambitious project.

The GF38's team visiting the future stadium

http://www.gf38.info/photos/06-07/06-div-chantier-01.jpg

http://www.gf38.info/photos/06-07/06-div-chantier-03.jpg

http://www.gf38.info/photos/06-07/06-div-chantier-04.jpg

http://www.gf38.info/photos/06-07/06-div-chantier-05.jpg

http://www.gf38.info/photos/06-07/06-div-chantier-06.jpg

http://www.gf38.info/photos/06-07/06-div-chantier-07.jpg

http://www.gf38.info/photos/06-07/06-div-chantier-08.jpg

http://www.gf38.info/photos/06-07/06-div-chantier-09.jpg

Always happy to see a new rugby stadium being built.
Go the game they play in Heaven.
Go Wallabies 2007 france

Always happy to see a new rugby stadium being built.
Go the game they play in Heaven.
Go Wallabies 2007 france

The "Stade d'Agglomeration" will be a football stadium that will host sometimes rugby games (big matches of FC Grenoble (http://www.fcgrenoble.com/), test matches, CS Bourgoin-Jallieu (http://www.csbj-rugby.fr/)...)

Well the only thing that bothers me about this stadium is the fu...ing 10 km between it and downtown. The best thing of Gerland is that it is almost right here, where it has to be... This stadium located in Decimes is nice and Aulas is definetely a no nonsense kinda guy! The real estate price around the stadium is going to be at a premium. But the 500 pricetag is also due to the crazy amount of roadwork that this stadium is going to need I hope it will not look to much of some US stadium, i.e in the middle of nowhere and surrounded by parking lots.
If Aulas says he has 500, No doubt there'll be naming and the price for it had been set high enough, pretty close to what Arsenal got from Emirates!
Very impressive, clearly 60000 seats is what he wanted but he could have had 80000 seater build instead.

The other thing that bothers me even if it's rather good to have them involved is that it's a HOK Stadium and I'm not looking forward to another emirates even if they put a roof on it!

Why not lowering the pitch or Gerland, pulling the stands towards the field and filling up the corners? That should make it 60.000

No can do gerland is a classified monument you can't touch that easily! Not that Aulas didn't try but it was a no go.

Gerland is a stadium classified "historic monument".
There is a lot of agreement to obtain to change anything.
Whatever you can do to this place, it will never be a modern stadium, there's too much things you cannot touch, modify and obviously destroy.
Perhaps I'm not completly answering your question but a modification of the actual Gerland is not something that would content Aulas dream.

Gerland is a stadium classified "historic monument".
There is a lot of agreement to obtain to change anything.
Whatever you can do to this place, it will never be a modern stadium, there's too much things you cannot touch, modify and obviously destroy.
Perhaps I'm not completly answering your question but a modification of the actual Gerland is not something that would content Aulas dream.

but if they don't play there anymore then the stadium has a bigger problem as it is a footballstadium without a footballclub... monument with no meaning it would be then...

Oh, gerland is allready scheduled to become rugby club stadium once the grand stade is build.
I Believe Lyon also plan to rule europe in Rugby, as they are about to do with Football.
Undertand me, I'm not a big fan a OL but I have to admit that they have what's needed to become, and remain for a certain amount of season, europe Top football team.
So the big stadium enters perfectly in this pan.

The plan for Gerland once the new stadium is up is to dowsize it to roughly 30000 seats and welcome the LOU lyon rugby team, hopefully turn pro by then right now they play in rugby division 2. But they do have backing from some sponsors of OL.

Aren't both fc grenoble rugby and gf going to use the new stadium. I thought they were turning lesdiguiere into a regular amateur sport stadium?

No, the "Stade Lesdiguières" was a rugby stadium and will become again (after the end of construction of the "Stade d'Agglomération") a rugby stadium and will be use by the FCG (http://www.fcgrugby.com/FR/ACCUEIL/index.aspx) (rugby team).

The GF38 (http://www.grenoblefoot38.fr/) (football team) use today the "Stade Lesdiguières" because the old stadium "Charles Berty" was insalubrious...

Thanks for clearing that one up! back to the stadium of Lyon Football club. Any dwawings/planns?

Well we should see them poping up soon. but I'm expecting something like the emirates with a complete training center not too far from it and a big mall around it

Two news (source from sport daily newspaper "l'équipe"'s interviews of respective president/owner) :


1-Lille has opted for the building of a 50/55.000 seats rectractable roof stadium finished for summer 2010 (they hope everything can be finished for summer 2009). Lille président told that Lille's actual lack of a decent stadium makes the club loose around 40 millions euros per year.


-Lens has opted for the renovation of the Felix Bollaert stadium. the future capacity is still unkown but their top priority is to have a RETRACTABLE ROOF!!!!!!! they will also build around the stadium a high-grade hotel and some shop. No deadline is yet known.

nice update. a roof on bollaert I guess it,s possible but it's not going to be cheap. And it won't get more people coming to the stadium!

How are they going to put a roof on Bollaert? They will need to destroy the current roof of the stands,and build around it, something like a San Siro IMO

I don't know what the final project is for Lens but it's sure that to add a retractable roof, you have to completly renovate the stadium (to equalize the stands heights and complete the empty space betwwen them).
It should not be cheap......
Adding to this there will surely be a seating expansion, it should cost a lot of money.

Well I'm not really worried about money with Lens. It's a well structured club and they do have a good fan base. Even with bad season they make money and their President has no illusion to the current situation. He is rebuilding top to bottom.

The assistance is still strong they still play UEFA Cup. Honestly they do have green lights everywhere. I' m sure whatever they do with Bollaert will be good cause of one thing this stadium will be full times and times again through thick and thin. right now they still have an edge and they are likely to keep it.

I think they will bring the lowest stand to the heigth of the three which are the same height. I don't think they will fill the corners the way we are expecting it!

Lens owner owns a lot of real estate around the town so money is indeed not a problem.

the fact is that, as Lyon at its begining, they see things in long term and don't want, as marseille did in late 80's/early 90's, have everything right now.
their first goal is to have an attractive and performant tool in the stadium as the team is already one of the 5 top french clubs.
Once the tool (stadium) will be what they want, they will then built a very performant team but not like abramomafiaivitch did with shitsea, they will do it by regulary improving the team year bu year.

you have to completly renovate the stadium (to equalize the stands heights and complete the empty space betwwen them).
It should not be cheap......
Adding to this there will surely be a seating expansion, it should cost a lot of money.

If they "close" the corner stands, that will increase the capacity by maybe 10,000 seats. I don't think this would cost a lot of money. The roof is another problem but I am pretty sure you don't need to level the height stand unless it can't support the weight of the new roof.