Russian football's rusting crown
Published 28 March, 2008, 13:43
The start of the football season has seen the arrival of star players like Sergey Rebrov and Savo Milosevic and new teams in the form of Shinnik and Terek Grozny. But they will all still be playing at the same old stadiums, which remain below par.
You'd be very hard pushed to find someone who's favourite stadium in the world was in Russia.
Nine-times champions Spartak Moscow are planning a new stadium at Tushinskaya, on the site of a former aerodrome.
Spartak have shown how the new ground will look on their website, and the artist's impressions certainly look impressive.
But they say their new 42,000 seat stadium will be finished by 2010, a rather bold claim since they haven't even granted planning permission.
Yes, artificial grass and a borrowed stadium – that's what Spartak and CSKA players enjoy for every home match. The reality is that two of Russia's biggest club's are in fact homeless.
But the prize for worst ground has got to go to FC Moscow, with a ground so run down that they haven't even painted over their old name of Torpedo Metallurg on the stadium seats – despite changing the club's name more than four years ago.
The jewel in Russian football's rather rusting crown is probably the Cherkizovsky stadium.
Home to Lokomotiv, it's pretty modern – having been built just six years ago. But it's capacity of 32,000 – while big by Russian standards – would still prevent it from ever hosting a major European final.
That honour will go this year to the vastly bigger 84,000-seater Luzhniki.
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