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San SiroSan Siro

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Key facts

Clubs: AC Milan and FC Internazionale | Opening: 1926 | Capacity: 80,018 seats

History and description

Stadio San Siro was a project of AC Milan president Piero Pirelli. In the first two decades of the 20th century, Milan had already occupied various grounds and by the early 1920s played at a ground at the Viale Lombardia.

Though a perfectly fine ground, it soon turned out to be too small for the club’s growing number of fans, and therefore architect Stacchini, also responsible for Milan’s central station, was hired to design a complete new stadium.

Stadio San Siro officially opened on the 19th of September 1926 with a friendly between Milan and Inter (3-6). The stadium initially consisted of four separate stands and could hold 35,000 spectators.

San Siro was first owned by AC Milan, but was sold to the city of Milan in 1935, who were soon forced too enlarge the stadium due to the club’s increasing popularity.

Plans were made for a massive stadium for 150,000 spectators, but were in the end significantly scaled down. The redeveloped San Siro opened in 1939, and consisted of one fully enclosed tier.

Until 1945, Milan had been the sole occupant of San Siro, but were then joined by Inter, who had before played at the Arena Civica.

San Siro got further expanded in 1955 when a second tier got built on top of the first one, which resulted in a capacity of about 85,000 places.

In the following decades, San Siro hosted two European Cup finals, the first in 1965 between Inter and Benfica (1-0), and the second in 1970 between Feyenoord and Celtic (2-1).

The stadium had earlier gotten ignored as a playing venue for Euro 1968, but did get selected as a venue for Euro 1980. At the same time it got officially renamed Stadio Guiseppe Meazza, in honour of the ex-player of Inter as well as AC Milan.

During the 1980 European championships, San Siro hosted three first round group matches.

Soon after, Italy got awarded the 1990 World Cup, and it became clear that a major upgrade was needed. For a moment, the option of building a new stadium was contemplated, but the architects Giancarlo Ragazzi, Enrico Hoffer, and Leo Finzi instead chose for an ambitious redevelopment plan.

Works included the construction of a third tier, a roof that would cover all seats, and eleven cylindrical concrete towers around the stadium to support the extra tier and roof structure. The resulting capacity was 85,700 seats.

During the World Cup, San Siro hosted the opening match between Argentina and Cameroon (0-1), three further group matches, a round of 16 match, and the quarter-final between Germany FR and Czechoslovakia (1-0).

The stadium got further refurbished in later years, and capacity reduced slightly due to UEFA safety requirements. In 2001, it hosted the Champions League final between FC Bayern and Valencia (1-1).

In early 2012, Inter announced the intention to build a new club-owned stadium, which they hope to move into in 2016. Further details are expected later in 2012. AC Milan is likely to stay at San Siro.

Season Milan average Inter average 1996–97 55,894 50,806 1997–98 54,432 67,825 1998–99 57,760  68,459 1999–00 58,522 66,546 2000–01 52,304 55,582 2001–02 58,616 62,434 2002–03 61,534  61,943 2003–04 63,245  58,352 2004–05 63,595 57,295  2005–06 59,993 51,371   2006–07 47,117 48,284  2007–08 56,579 52,010  2008–09 59,731 55,345  2009–10 43,084 53,493   2010-11 53,924  59,277  2011-12 49,020 44,806