MANCHESTER - Etihad Stadium (47,405)

[eddyk]

I didnt think premiership games were allowed to be played indoors.

Ill look into it.

[dgnr8]

I find the notion of indoor football ridiculous. The point is being able to be the best on the shortest and longest grass on the hottest or wettest of days. Within reason of course, but for fucks sake, retractable roofs? Wembley has the right idea with it being on the away ends for sunny days, but covering a full pitch for a footy game so the 2 teams of Frenchmen/Spaniards/insertnationalityhere don't get cold? Naff.

Anyway, COMS is amazing, a truly superb stadium. Some lettering on the seats wouldn't go amiss though, and maybe something draped from the tips of the roof in a dark blue to give the fans a more enclosed feel. Something gay like that. Been there to see City but I also went to the Commonwealth Games opening ceremony and that was proper awesome like.

[NavyBlue]

I like this stadium alot...

The only thing that lets it down is the lack of video screens.

[Nils]

I didnt think premiership games were allowed to be played indoors.

Ill look into it.

I can only speak for the German Bundesliga: Here it is allowed to play with the roof closed. Today both games at Schalke and Frankfurt were played with closed roofs.

[sakor1]

What was the Capacity during the Commonwealth Games?

Stu

[BobDaBuilder]

Easily the finest stadium in Manchester with Bolton coming a clear second.

[dgnr8]

Commonwealth capacity was 38,000. After the games, the temporary stand was knocked down to complete the bowl and the pitch was sunk a few meters to construct a new bottom tier all the way around the bowl taking it up to 48,000.

[Jonesy55]

Originally Posted by cardiff

I belive that the design of the city of manchester stadium is of poorer design, for one it does not have a roof in the wetest city in the UK!

Manchester isn't as wet as Plymouth, Cardiff, Swansea, Glasgow, Belfast and other places in the west of GB.

http://www.worldweather.org/010/m010.htm

[www.sercan.de]

image hosted on flickr


image hosted on flickr

bigger one
http://www.flickr.com/photos/diebmx/428573521/sizes/o/


image hosted on flickr

bigger one
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jandnph...79238/sizes/o/

image hosted on flickr

[lpioe]

This one was really nicely converted into a football ground.

[HoldenV8]

The ends are what they should have done originally with the Sydney Football Stadium. The biggest problem there is that the SFS was really made too small initially (40,000). At least now its closer to what COM Stadium is now that it has a 45,000 capacity.

[Carrerra]

Doesn't the stadium have any plan of expansion? The club was taken over to a Thai billionare and it seems he tries to upgrade ManCity to the big club level. I think it's time for considering stadium expansion.

[carlspannoosh]

I doubt they would contemplate expansion until they have at least won a trophy or qualified for the Champions League.At the moment the stadium is just the right size I reckon. Good choice for The EUFA Cup Final.

[andysimo123]

City don't own it. The Council do.

[veronika]

Originally Posted by cardiff

I belive that the design of the city of manchester stadium is of poorer design, for one it does not have a roof in the wetest city in the UK!

The spectators are covered by the roof. The pitch has a surface infiltration rate of 150mm per hour. The cost of this pitch to construct was in the region of 750k.
The players are able to play with excellent surface charachteristics on such a pitch when wet or heavy rain.
If it were to rain in uk 150mm in one hour you would need to worry about other things than attending a football match.
The cost to construct a retractable roof for this stadium would have been in the region of 200 million pounds extra.

What you and many others on these forums are saying when you bang on about retractable rooves simply does not make economic sense to the constructor.

[Chogmook]

I might be a Man U fan, but if there was a league for best kept pitch, City would storm it. The groundsman there does a grand job. Who needs a roof?

[Carrerra]

Originally Posted by dgnr8

Commonwealth capacity was 38,000. After the games, the temporary stand was knocked down to complete the bowl and the pitch was sunk a few meters to construct a new bottom tier all the way around the bowl taking it up to 48,000.

I didn't know that the stadium used to have athletic tracks that enabled it to host Commonwealth games. Thanks for the info!

It is the most ideal way to dig the ground a few meters to construct a new bottom tier all the way around the stadium. I wonder why they don't do the same to other athletic stadiums in the world, especially many Italian stadiums.

For example, I heard that George Soros is considering taking over AS Roma and constructing new stadium for it. But instead of newly building the stadium, AS Roma can get a fantastic "pure fooball stadium" of at least 90K for much less money if they do the same to Olympico as people did to Mancity stadium!!!!!!!!

Of course I know that Olympico is owned by the city so they might have to purchase the stadium itself before converting it into football specific arena but even if so, it would be much cheaper than newly building the stadium because the purchase of Olympico would not cost much(It was built so long ago!)

Maybe the structure of Olympico makes it impossible?

[www.sercan.de]

Rome Olympic stadium is used for Atheletic events

BTW, whats the exact capacity of this stadium?

[veronika]

Originally Posted by Chogmook

I might be a Man U fan, but if there was a league for best kept pitch, City would storm it. The groundsman there does a grand job. Who needs a roof?

There is such a league for every division and an award every year. This year I think in premier was Arsenal,spurs and villa. City i dont know about 7th I think. Man u could be excellent they have the money to adpot the same technology as man city and others like arsenal but so far they havent done it and no one knows why its a mystery. Maybe they prefer a medium quality pitch rather than an excellent surface?

[G.C.]

The place will rock like it never has before when the Rangers play there.