Anyone who’s played soccer has dealt with a bad pitch at one time or another, be it from bad weather or negligent grounds keeping. It’s expected at the youth level, but it can be shocking at the professional level as well — which is why we’ve compiled this list of the worst football pitches of all time, the type of playing fields that terrify footballers.
National team stadiums are something of a foreign concept in the United States, where both the men’s and women’s sides play matches from Carson, California, to Foxborough, Massachusetts, and everywhere in-between. Other national teams have a similar approach — Germany, Brazil and Spain among them — but there’s something magical about a fixed location, be it the glamor of England at Wembley, the history of Mexico at the Azteca or the ferocity of Argentina at El Monumental.
Despite the best attempts of stadiums built in the late 80s and early 90s to suck the soul out of everything, we’ve now entered an arms race in super-stadium building brought forth by mega-wealthy owners bent on redefining arenas as both works of art and places of entertainment. Still, there’s nothing like some of the weirdest stadium features that’ve withstood the test of time, and we’re more than happy to add some of the latest eccentricities to the fold.
Here are 15 designs and features that immediately capture the eye.
With fans barred from entering stadiums due to the impact of coronavirus, Danish league leaders FC Midtjylland took an imaginative approach to their return to action with a 'drive-in' broadcast for supporters.
The club installed giant screens in the parking lot of their MCH Arena to allow fans to watch matches from the their cars from the more than 2,000 available spaces.
The new Crew Stadium is slowly rising at the center of the Confluence Village neighborhood near downtown Columbus. The $300 million project is slated to open in time for the start of the 2021 stadium, and the latest renderings of the ground look spectacular.
Some visible features include an exclusive Nordecke entrance, which is the safe standing end of the stadium that’ll house the Crew’s supporters’ groups. This area will also have the league’s first beer garden. Hell yes.
A new Columbus Crew stadium is coming to the city’s downtown Arena District and photos released Tuesday are making the rest of the league envious.