Addis Ababa Stadium (

Amharic Amharic is an Ethio-Semitic language, which is a subgrouping within the Semitic branch of the Afroasiatic languages. It is spoken as a first language by the Amhara people, and also serves as a lingua franca for all other metropolitan populati ...

: አዲስ አበባ ስታዲየም) is a

multi-purpose stadium A multi-purpose stadium is a type of stadium designed to be easily used for multiple types of events. While any stadium could potentially host more than one type of sport or event, this concept usually refers to a design philosophy that stres ...

Addis Ababa Addis Ababa (; ,) is the capital city of Ethiopia, as well as the regional state of Oromia. With an estimated population of 2,739,551 inhabitants as of the 2007 census, it is the largest city in the country and the List of cities in Africa b ...

Ethiopia Ethiopia, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country located in the Horn of Africa region of East Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the north, Djibouti to the northeast, Somalia to the east, Ken ...

. It is used mostly for

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

matches although it also has athletics facilities. The stadium has a capacity of 20,000 people.

History

Addis Ababa Stadium was constructed in 1940 in the Italian ruled Addis Ababa, with the name "Stadio Littorio". I It hosted several matches during the

1962 The year saw the Cuban Missile Crisis, which is often considered the closest the world came to a Nuclear warfare, nuclear confrontation during the Cold War. Events January * January 1 – Samoa, Western Samoa becomes independent from Ne ...

1968 Events January–February * January 1968, January – The I'm Backing Britain, I'm Backing Britain campaign starts spontaneously. * January 5 – Prague Spring: Alexander Dubček is chosen as leader of the Communist Party of Cze ...

and 1976 African Cup of Nations, including the final of the 1962 (won by Ethiopia over the United Arab Republic) and 1968 editions and the final group stage of the 1976 tournament. Later in 1999, it was renovated for the 2001 CAF African Youth Championship held in Ethiopia. In this championship, the Ethiopia's National Youth team came fourth. The Ethiopian youth team thereby qualified for the first time for the

2001 FIFA World Youth Championship The 2001 FIFA World Youth Championship took place in Argentina between 17 June and 8 July 2001. The 2001 championship was the 13th contested. The tournament took part in six cities, Buenos Aires, Córdoba, Mendoza, Rosario, Salta, and Mar del ...

that took place in

Argentina Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...

. Addis Ababa Stadium is located at the heart of Addis Ababa near

Legehar train station Legehar (from ) was the main railway station in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, the terminal station of the metre-gauge Ethio-Djibouti Railway that connected Ethiopia's capital to the Port of Djibouti. Completed in 1917, the station was a central part ...

and Meskel Square. The stadium hosts both international soccer and athletics competitions. Great athletes like the legendary Abebe Bikila and Haile Gebrselassie have competed at the stadium. According to

IAAF World Athletics, formerly known as the International Amateur Athletic Federation and International Association of Athletics Federations and formerly abbreviated as the IAAF, is the international sports governing body, governing body for the sport ...

certification, Addis Ababa stadium has Class II certificate for its athletics facilities. Between 30 April and 4 May 2008, Addis Ababa Stadium hosted the 16th African Athletics Championships.

Stands

The small section immediately to the right of the main stand was called "Kemeneshe" while the stand in the right corner of the stadium was called "Abebe Bikila" because there was a shop with the same name under stands on the exterior side. The stands to the left of the main stand was called "Fasika Ber", named after advertisements displayed in this section of the stadium. The section immediately to the left of this was called "Tesera". The stands opposite of the main stand are historically known as "Katanga", alluding to the military personnel that used to sit in these stands after returning from peace keeping missions in Katanga,

DRC The Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), also known as the DR Congo, Congo-Kinshasa, or simply the Congo (the last ambiguously also referring to the neighbouring Republic of the Congo), is a country in Central Africa. By land area, it is t ...

. The stadium has 12 entrance tunnels.

Future

Renovations

In January 2021, the sport commission of the stadium signed an agreement for design, consultation and management of renovations to the stadium.

New Stadium

Construction on a new

FIFA The Fédération Internationale de Football Association (), more commonly known by its acronym FIFA ( ), is the international self-regulatory governing body of association football, beach soccer, and futsal. It was founded on 21 May 1904 to o ...

and Olympic-standard 62,000 seat

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 completely or partially surrounded by a tiered structure designed to allow spectators to stand or sit ...

is due in 2019.

LAVA Lava is molten or partially molten rock (magma) that has been expelled from the interior of a terrestrial planet (such as Earth) or a Natural satellite, moon onto its surface. Lava may be erupted at a volcano or through a Fissure vent, fractu ...

, DESIGNSPORT and local Ethiopian firm JDAW won the international competition held by the Federal Sport Commission, Ethiopia to design the stadium and sports village. The design combines local identity, such as rock cut architecture and the massob basket, with new technology. The stadium is being built by the China State Construction Engineering Corporation.

References

External links

worldstadiums.com

Photos at cafe.daum.net/stade
a
fussballtempel.net
{{Italian Ethiopia Athletics (track and field) venues in Ethiopia Football venues in Addis Ababa Multi-purpose stadiums in Ethiopia