Madejski Stadium

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Madejski Stadium

The Mad Stad

Location	Reading, England
Opened	22 August 1998
Owner	Reading Football Club
Surface	Desso GrassMaster
Construction cost	>£50m
Tenants
London Irish (1998-present) Reading F.C. (1998-present)
Capacity
24,161
Dimensions
105 m x 68 m^[1]

The Madejski Stadium is a football stadium in Reading, England.

1 Overview
2 Stands
3 Attendance
- 3.1 FAPL
- 3.2 Guinness Premiership
4 Rugby Supporters
5 References
6 External links

The stadium is the home of Reading Football Club and was opened on 22 August 1998 when Luton Town were beaten 3-0 with Grant Brebner having the honour of scoring the first goal at the stadium. The rugby union club, London Irish, also play their home games there as tenants. It also provides the finish for the Reading Half Marathon.

It is an all-seater bowl stadium with a capacity of 24,250 and is located close to the M4 motorway. It was built on the site of a former household waste dump and the stadium is surrounded by methane vents. The stadium cost more than £50m to build and the pitch incorporates a system of synthetic fibres interwoven with natural grass, installed at a cost of more than £750,000.^[1] The site used to be a landfill, and Reading Borough Council sold the land to the club for £1.^{[citation needed]}

Madejski Stadium has also held various music concerts, including the Summer XS festival series. Performers at the Madejski Stadium have included the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Blue, Busted, Craig David, Elton John, Girls Aloud, Lulu, McFly and Rachel Stevens.

The stadium is named after Reading's chairman John Madejski but it is owned by the football club.

For the first time in their history, Reading Football Club participated in the elite Premier League in the 2006-07 season. As a result of the sell-out crowds for their first few fixtures of the season, the club announced their intention, in October 2006^[2], to make a planning application to extend the ground to between 37,000 to 38,000 seats. The application was made on 24 January 2007, proposing initially the extension of the East Stand with a further 6,000 seats (raising capacity to around 30,000) and subsequently extension of the North and South Stands to reach the full proposed capacity.^[3] On Thursday 24th May 2007 it was announced that planning permission had been granted to extend the stadium to a capacity of 36,900.^[4] The first phase will expand the East Stand by 6,600 seats and work will start in summer 2008,^[5] followed by expansion of the North and South Stands the following summer.

Home end stand.

The South Stand has a capacity up to 2,327 for away fans. For the Premier League season 2006-07, half of the South Stand (that which meets the East Stand) is designated for away supporters, whilst the half which meets the West Stand is for ticket-only home supporters.

Opposite the tunnel and director's box.

This stand contains a lower and an upper tier, but the upper level does not overhang the lower tier. Executive boxes are found between the two tiers. The tunnel and dugouts are on this side of the stadium.

The outside of the stand contains the Millennium Madejski Hotel.

Average:

2006-07: 23,829

Total:

2006-07: 452758 - Ranked #14 in Premier League

Highest:

2006-07: 24,122 - 10th of February, 2007 vs Aston Villa

Highest

2006-07: 22,648 - 18th of March, 2007 vs London Wasps

Since the stadium has had Guinness Premiership club London Irish as tenants, initially there were a few complaints from both home and visiting fans. Most of these centered around match day stewards not having enough experience in dealing with a rugby crowd and thus trying to separate home & away fans, not realising that Rugby clubs let fans take alcohol to their seats, etc. This initially caused consternation amongst both London Irish and visiting fans alike. However, as the stadium staff grew more experienced in dealing with Rugby fans, such mistakes have been ironed out and the experience is a much more enjoyable one.^{[citation needed]}