A couple of stadium news arrived this week. First, that architect Fenwick has found the way to make the completion of Nou Mestalla €60 million cheaper than the original estimate. God knows that the club needs it to be finished for the sake of it’s FUBAR economical situation. And who wouldn’t have a five star stadium as a frame for their ball kicking heroes? But a part of me wish it will never be completed…
The other good news of the week is that Valencia has revamped their stadium tour at ”the not so Nou” Mestalla, inaugurated Thursday night by none other than Mario Kempes himself. But images in the media sure makes the saliva run. It seems to honour the stadiums long and legendary history in a way it deserves. A history so long that the ”ForeverTour” tag seems appropriate.
I’ve been at quite a few mytical stadiums in my time. Wembley (the old one), Boca’s Bombonera, Olympiastadion in Munich… but none quite give me the shivers as grand, old Mestalla does. The tall, steep stands that seem to fall over the the green rectangle in the middle. The location; a typical Valencian part of town with authentic local bars and businesses. As long as your not in the uppermost terraces, the proximity to the pitch gives an almost intimidating intimacy to the players on the pitch. A match is never boring here, even if the football isn’t always of ”jogo bonito” standard. In the cauldrun that Mestalla is, something is always cooking.
So even if Nou Mestalla will be the envy of many other clubs when/if it ever is built, the crisis-struck and wannabe-posh aura of Benicalap won’t give the same vibes as the worn concrete colossus in Avenida de Suecia. Not by a mile! Can you imagine Manolo el del Bombo’s bar inside a Corte Inglés? He’d rather eat his hat before that happens! So while we suffer the lack of a way out of the debt, and Nou Mestalla stands there like an ugly parking lot, we should all seize the opportunity to visit the best old school stadium in the world. Estadio Mestalla. It won’t be there forever…
Pål Ødegård (@paalpot75)