About the name of the stadium “Atletico Madrid”, today many football fans are interested. The reason for this interest is the huge popularity of the club around the world. The team brought together well-known coaches and football players who annually fight for the highest places in national and European cups. “Atletico Madrid”, the stadium of which is filled with fans at almost every match, has a rich history and an army of fans, not only in Spain, but around the world.
Base
As already mentioned, “Atleteco Madrid” is the most popular, and part-time, the oldest club in Spain. The founding day of the football team is April 26, 1903. The founders of the club are three students who studied in Madrid. Initially, Atletico Madrid, whose stadium is today the largest and most beautiful, did not even have a home arena.
In general, in the first years of its existence, the club was supposed to be one of the branches of another well-known Spanish team - Athletic Bilbao. As a result of this, “Athletic Madrid” did not participate in the ongoing competitions, and played only friendly matches. Despite this, the team showed quite a good game and could fight even with strong opponents.
registration
Only on February 20, 1907 the team was able to register with the Football Federation of Spain. The club became known as the Athletic Club de Madrid, and not the Atletico Madrid. A stadium for the performance of the team has not yet been provided. From that moment, the football club became independent and received the right to speak in ongoing tournaments.
Club colors
Probably everyone who is even a little interested in football knows that Atletico Madrid, whose stadium is called Vincente Calderon, has a red-and-white color. However, this was not always the case. Initially, the colors of the club were similar to the colors of Athletics from Bilbao - a blue and white uniform. The changes occurred in 1911, when it was decided to try out T-shirts that had red and white vertical stripes.
For sewing forms at that time often used material for sewing mattresses. That is why carriers of this kind are often called "mattresses". However, the nickname was especially strongly entrusted to Atletico Madrid.
Stadium
As mentioned above, initially Atletico Madrid did not have its own stadium. The president helped the club get a home arena . The stadium was named O'Donnell. The first game took place on February 9, 1913. However, in this arena the team from Madrid played only ten years, and in 1923 received a new place for games. Atletico Madrid Stadium, with a capacity of 35,800 spectators, hosted the first match against Real Sociedad.
The first part of the twenties brought the team three titles that were won in regional competitions. Already in 1926, the Madrid team was close to winning the country's cup, but in the final lost to the legendary “Barcelona”.
The story of "Vicente Calderon"
The fast-growing and growing Atletico Madrid constantly required an increasingly spacious arena. By the year 60 of the last century, the Atletico Madrid stadium, whose name was Metropolitano, had ceased to hold all the fans in the stands, and there were many of them in Madrid. In the spring of next year, the president of the team decided to acquire a plot of land, which will become the basis for the foundation of a new more spacious stadium. The construction of the arena began almost immediately.
However, not everything was so simple. The construction of such a huge facility required significant financial injections. A few years before the start of work, the team management was forced to take a certain amount of loans. Fans of “Atleteko” did not stand aside, making personal savings. It took five years to erect the stadium. The official opening took place in October 1966 at the game against “Valencia”. Sixty-two thousand spectators gathered to support the team on such a significant day. The game, by the way, ended with a score of 1: 1. The new stadium was called Manzanaro.
In the spring, the arena hosted the first Madrid derby in its history. The match with Real Madrid did not reveal the winner, ending with a score of 2: 2. In the summer of 1971, the leadership of Atletico Madrid held a meeting at which it was decided to rename the stadium. The new name is Vicente Calderon. The arena received this name in honor of the director, who helped the team achieve significant success. The period of his stay in the club is called by many fans as golden. Soon after the renaming, the arena also underwent reconstruction.
The first match after the reconstruction took place in May 1972. The national teams of Spain and Hungary fought on the field. This game was visited by many representatives of Spain. In the summer of 1980, a meeting of the club management was held at which a new reconstruction was discussed. It should have ended before the start of the World Cup, which took place in 1982. Atletico had to take on part of the costs, the rest of the management received from the FIFA committee.
In the fall of 2008, the UEFA committee imposed serious sanctions on Atlético. The result was that a demand was put forward to close the stadium. The reason was the incident that happened at the match, “Atletico” - “Olympic Marseille”.
New team stadium
At the end of July 2007, the Atletico bosses, one of the local breweries and the mayor of the city organized a meeting at which they examined the documents according to which it turned out that the club was located on the banks of the Manzanares river. The team was denied reconstruction. Also, for three years, she was supposed to move to La Paineta, in which a terrorist attack was committed in 2005, the Atletico Madrid stadium, the photo of which could be seen in many magazines, was subject to demolition.
Prior to this, the arena was used for various athletic competitions and had a small capacity - twenty thousand spectators. Today, the stadium is in the final stages of construction. Its new capacity will be seventy-three thousand spectators. Atletico management will have to pay its full price. Vicente Calderon will be subject to demolition, and a park will appear in its place. Atletico will be able to enter the new arena after 2016. Fans of the team were extremely dissatisfied with the decision to demolish the old stadium of their favorite club, they still advocate its preservation.