Arto Tolsa Areena is a

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

stadium A stadium ( : stadiums or stadia) is a place or venue for (mostly) outdoor sports, concerts, or other events and consists of a field or stage either partly or completely surrounded by a tiered structure designed to allow spectators to stand o ...

Kotka Kotka (; ; la, Aquilopolis) is a city in the southern part of the Kymenlaakso province on the Gulf of Finland. Kotka is a major port and industrial city and also a diverse school and cultural city, which was formerly part of the old Kymi parish. ...

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

. It is the home stadium of

Kotkan Työväen Palloilijat Kotkan Työväen Palloilijat (abbreviated as KTP) is a Finnish football club based in Kotka, Finland, and currently competing in Finland's premier league, Veikkausliiga. The club was founded in 1927 and its colours are green and white. Immediate ...

(KTP). The stadium holds 4,780 and was inaugurated in 1952 for the

Helsinki Olympics The 1952 Summer Olympics ( fi, Kesäolympialaiset 1952; sv, Olympiska sommarspelen 1952), officially known as the Games of the XV Olympiad ( fi, XV olympiadin kisat; sv, Den XV olympiadens spel) and commonly known as Helsinki 1952 ( sv, Helsin ...

. The stadium's record attendance was made during the Olympic Games in the

match between the

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...

and

Bulgaria Bulgaria (; bg, България, Bǎlgariya), officially the Republic of Bulgaria,, ) is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the eastern flank of the Balkans, and is bordered by Romania to the north, Serbia and North Macedon ...

, the score having been 2–1

a.e.t. Overtime or extra time is an additional period of play specified under the rules of a sport to bring a game to a decision and avoid declaring the match a tie or draw where the scores are the same. In some sports, this extra period is played only ...

Depending on the source, the record is 10,000, or 10,637 or 10,950.Harri Levänen: "Kyllä Urheilukeskukseen mahtui", ''Kymen Sanomat'', July 5, 2010. Arto Tolsa Areena used to be known as "Urheilukeskus" ("Sports Center" in Finnish). It got its current name after it was renovated around the turn of millennium. The current name comes from

Arto Tolsa Arto Vilho Tolsa (9 August 1945 – 30 March 1989) was a Finnish footballer. Career Tolsa started his career in his hometown of Kotka, playing for Kotkan Työväen Palloilijat. He was promoted to first team as a 16 year old for 1962 second di ...

, who was a legendary

Finnish Finnish may refer to: * Something or someone from, or related to Finland * Culture of Finland * Finnish people or Finns, the primary ethnic group in Finland * Finnish language, the national language of the Finnish people * Finnish cuisine See also ...

player of Kotkan Työväen Palloilijat, the predecessor of KTP. The covered main stand holds 2,500 spectators. The size of the pitch is 105 by 65 metres. The power of the lighting system is 1200 lux. At the beginning of the 2015 season, the pitch was converted to an artificial playing surface.

References

Venues of the 1952 Summer Olympics Football venues in Finland Olympic football venues Sports venues completed in 1952 {{Summer-Olympic-venue-stub