Dens Park
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Dens Park, officially known as Kilmac Stadium for sponsorship reasons, 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 ...
in
Dundee Dundee (; sco, Dundee; gd, Dùn Dè or ) is Scotland's fourth-largest city and the 51st-most-populous built-up area in the United Kingdom. The mid-year population estimate for 2016 was , giving Dundee a population density of 2,478/km2 or ...
,
Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...
, which is the home of club
Dundee F.C. Dundee Football Club is a professional football club based in the city of Dundee, Scotland, founded in 1893. The team are nicknamed "The Dark Blues" or "The Dee". The club plays its home matches at Dens Park. The club was formed after a merg ...
and has a capacity of .
Tannadice Park Tannadice Park ( gd, Pàirc Thanachais), usually referred to as Tannadice, is a football stadium in Dundee, Scotland. It is the home ground of Dundee United F.C., who have played at Tannadice since the club was founded as Dundee Hibernian in ...
, the home of rivals
Dundee United Dundee United Football Club is a Scottish professional football club based in the city of Dundee. The club name is usually abbreviated to Dundee United. Formed in 1909, originally as Dundee Hibernian, the club changed to the present name in 1 ...
, is just 200 yards (183 metres) away.


History

Dundee moved to "Dens" from their first stadium at
Carolina Port Carolina Port was a football stadium in Dundee, Scotland. The sport's first major venue in the city, it was an early home of Dundee F.C. and staged Dundee's first international match in 1896. History East End, one of the leading Dundee clubs, w ...
in 1899. Following Dundee's successful league campaign during the 1998–99 season, Dens park had to be redeveloped to adhere to the new
Scottish Premier League The Scottish Premier League (SPL) was the top level league competition for professional football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football' ...
seat-capacity guidelines. Dundee were therefore required to redevelop the East and West terraces. Barr Stadium Construction were charged with the task of removing the existing concrete terraces and the construction of two 3,000-seat stands. The stands were built in a record time of 82 days for the start of the 1999–00 season. The two near-identical single-tier Bobby Cox and
Bob Shankly Robert Fleming Blyth Shankly (25 February 1910 – 5 May 1982) was a professional football player and manager from the village of Glenbuck in Ayrshire, Scotland. He was the elder brother to Bill Shankly the former Liverpool manager. Bob Shankl ...
Stands sit at either end of the ground. The former usually houses home supporters while the latter houses the away supporters. A new Club Shop and ticket office were also built. Undersoil heating was installed in 2005. Dens Park has hosted two
Scottish League Cup The Scottish League Cup (also known as the Viaplay Cup for sponsorship reasons) is a football competition open to all Scottish Professional Football League (SPFL) clubs. First held in 1946–47, it is the oldest national League Cup in existen ...
finals and, on 25 November 2007, hosted its first
Scottish Challenge Cup The Scottish Professional Football League Challenge Cup,Dundee Dundee (; sco, Dundee; gd, Dùn Dè or ) is Scotland's fourth-largest city and the 51st-most-populous built-up area in the United Kingdom. The mid-year population estimate for 2016 was , giving Dundee a population density of 2,478/km2 or ...
to have held full Scottish Internationals, having held the event thrice. The other Dundee ground to have held an international was
Carolina Port Carolina Port was a football stadium in Dundee, Scotland. The sport's first major venue in the city, it was an early home of Dundee F.C. and staged Dundee's first international match in 1896. History East End, one of the leading Dundee clubs, w ...
. Dens Park was named best pitch in Division 1 in 2008. The record attendance at Dens Park is 43,024, which was set in 1953 when Dundee played host to Rangers in the Scottish Cup. Also in 2007, Dens Park along with
McDiarmid Park McDiarmid Park is a stadium in Perth, Scotland, used mainly for association football. It has been the home ground of Scottish Premiership side St Johnstone since its opening in 1989. The stadium has an all-seated capacity of . As well as St Jo ...
in
Perth Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth is ...
, hosted group 4 UEFA European Under-19 Championship Elite Round games.
Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...
,
Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of ...
,
Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...
and
Georgia Georgia most commonly refers to: * Georgia (country), a country in the Caucasus region of Eurasia * Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the Southeast United States Georgia may also refer to: Places Historical states and entities * Related to the ...
faced off against each other in April between the 23rd and 28th in a bid to qualify for 2007 UEFA European Under-19 Championship. Dundee's own
Kevin McDonald Kevin Hamilton McDonald (born May 16, 1961) is a Canadian actor, voice actor and comedian. He is a member of the comedy troupe The Kids in the Hall, who have appeared together in a number of stage, television and film productions, most notably th ...
played in Scotland's campaign which attracted the Dundee crowd. A few of the youngsters that played in these games went on to become big names in football including:
Fábio Coentrão Fábio Alexandre da Silva Coentrão (; born 11 March 1988) is a Portuguese former professional footballer. Mainly a left-back, he also operated as a winger and occasionally as a defensive midfielder. After starting playing professionally with ...
,
Rui Patrício Rui Pedro dos Santos Patrício (; born 15 February 1988) is a Portuguese professional footballer who plays as a goalkeeper for Serie A team Roma and the Portugal national team. He is often nicknamed "São Patrício" (''Saint Patrício'') for ...
,
Daniel Carriço Daniel Filipe Martins Carriço (born 4 August 1988) is a Portuguese professional footballer who plays mainly as a central defender. He spent most of his early professional career with Sporting CP, appearing in 154 official matches over four and ...
, Ross McCormack and
Onur Kıvrak Onur Recep Kıvrak (born 1 January 1988) is a Turkish former professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper. He played for Trabzonspor before his announcement of retirement from professional football in January 2019. Although he does not nec ...
. Portugal won the group with seven points (two wins and one draw against Georgia) and so advanced to the finals.


Future

In 2002, plans were drawn up for a new stadium to be built in the city as part of Scotland's bid to host the 2008 European Football Championship. This stadium would have been shared by Dundee and near-neighbours Dundee United, which would have required the two to leave their historic grounds at Dens Park and
Tannadice Stadium Tannadice Park ( gd, Pàirc Thanachais), usually referred to as Tannadice, is a football stadium in Dundee, Scotland. It is the home ground of Dundee United F.C., who have played at Tannadice since the club was founded as Dundee Hibernian in 1 ...
respectively. The stadium was planned for construction on a new site at Caird Park. Scotland was not successful in their bid, however, and so these plans were postponed. They could be resurrected should Scotland launch a successful bid for future European Championships. Both clubs strongly oppose a ground sharing agreement but were interested in a new ground sharing arrangement that would have taken place if
Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...
and
Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...
had failed to meet
UEFA Union of European Football Associations (UEFA ; french: Union des associations européennes de football; german: Union der europäischen Fußballverbände) is one of six continental bodies of governance in association football. It governs f ...
's expectations for hosting
Euro 2012 The 2012 UEFA European Football Championship, commonly referred to as UEFA Euro 2012 or simply Euro 2012, was the 14th European Championship for men's national football teams organised by UEFA. The final tournament, held between 8 June and 1 ...
. In late 2007, Dundee announced plans to sell much of the land south of the pitch to a real-estate developer. As part of the plans, new flats/houses would be constructed on the presently unused portion of the land and a new southern stand would be freely constructed alongside the pitch. This would significantly increase the capacity of the stadium and would upgrade facilities at the club. In early 2008, Dundee's Chief Executive Officer Dave MacKinnon announced that the club should have "positive news" regarding the project. However, nothing more was heard on the matter and at present there are no plans to make any changes to the ground. In May 2009, it was reported that the stadium is owned by local businessman John Bennett who, despite having invested heavily in Dundee, has rejoined the Dundee United board, where he had previously been a director until September 2008. In October 2014, Dundee Supporter's Society announced they have put forward plans to then club chairman Bill Colvin which may allow the club to buy back the stadium from current owner John Bennett. They also expressed, this was not a plan to enable the Supporter's Society to own the Stadium but for the club themselves, they said they will "simply administer the scheme". In April 2015, Colvin announced that negotiations were taking place to buy back the Stadium from current owner John Bennett and his company Sandeman Holdings. In August 2016, club owners John Nelms and Tim Keyes were reported to have bought land in the Camperdown area of Dundee, next to the city's Ice Arena. It was then made clear in February 2017 that the plan for this land was to develop a new stadium for the club due to the increasing maintenance costs of Dens Park, although plans for a move were described by Nelms as being "early doors" in a video interview published on the club's website. Documents related to the proposed new stadium were submitted in August 2017, ahead of a formal planning application. In June 2022, Dundee would move their day-to-day operations away from Dens Park and into Dundee and Angus College's Gardyne Campus.


Greyhound racing

In 1932 Dundee FC agreed a lease with the Dundee Greyhound Racing Company Ltd for a period of ten years for a nominal capital of £25,000. The first night of greyhound racing took place on 9 November 1932 with grass having replaced the existing cinder running track and the main grandstand was fitted out with a glass front to allow patrons the ability to watch racing in all weathers. This new facility also contained a refreshment counter and a totalisator booth. A large totalisator board was erected on the Dens Road side of the ground. John Jolliffe a private trainer moved to Scotland in 1932 and took over as General and Racing Manager at Dens Park for a period of three years before moving onto the larger
Holburn Stadium Holburn Stadium, also known as Aberdeen Greyhound Stadium, was a greyhound racing stadium in Aberdeen, Scotland. It is not to be confused with the Aberdeen Regent Park Greyhound Stadium. History The stadium was located on the south west side ...
in
Aberdeen Aberdeen (; sco, Aiberdeen ; gd, Obar Dheathain ; la, Aberdonia) is a city in North East Scotland, and is the third most populous city in the country. Aberdeen is one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas (as Aberdeen City), and ...
in 1935. He introduced selling races at the track and the racing took place under
National Greyhound Racing Club The National Greyhound Racing Club was an organisation that governed Greyhound racing in the United Kingdom. History The National Greyhound Racing Club (NGRC) was formed in 1928 and this body would be responsible for regulation, licensing and the ...
(NGRC) rules. Distances raced over were 260, 450, 460 and 650 yards. Greyhound racing ended at the end of May 1936 due to the liabilities of the company resulting in a winding up order. In 1937 an attempt to start racing nearby at the East Craigie FC ground failed due to local protests. The second period of racing came over fifty years later in 1992 when Ron Dixon arrived at the football club. The Canadian businessman owned a company called Dundee Leisure and was the new chairman of the football club. He secured planning permission for a greyhound track and new car parking facilities with further plans to build a new stand, a conference centre and an ice rink on site. The 400-metre circumference sand greyhound track was constructed and a Bramwich Hare was installed in addition to a Datatote totalisator system. Racing started on 21 October 1994 under the management of Eddie Ramsay but Dixon's vision never materialised with the greyhound racing ending on 11 December 1996.


References

{{Scottish greyhound tracks Dundee F.C. Football venues in Dundee Sports venues in Dundee Scottish Premier League venues Scottish Football League venues Scottish Professional Football League venues Scotland national football team venues Sports venues completed in 1899 1899 establishments in Scotland Defunct greyhound racing venues in the United Kingdom Greyhound racing in Scotland