Korona Kielce - Stadium

Stadium

See also: Kielce City Stadium

In response to Korona's successes and the club owner, Krzysztof Klicki's, affirmation that the club would play in the premier league and battle for European cups, Kielce municipal authorities approved the construction of a new stadium. Unfortunately, the stadium turned out to be much too small. Because of this the club played its first round in the highest division at its old stadium (currently used by reserves and youth teams) to permit further work on the new facility.

Only eighteen months after the start of the building project, the keys of the new stadium were officially handed to the club. The first premier league match was played on 1 April 2006 against Zagłębie Lubin.

The Korona stadium, although it stands on the same site as an earlier stadium, is an entirely new facility, built according to UEFA recommendations and modern design ideas. In this way it differs from most other football stadiums in Poland which were built during the communist era or earlier and only slightly modernized to meet basic UEFA standards.

Kielce stadium can seat 15,550 fans, however, due to Polish regulations, which require a buffer zone between local fans and the visitors section, league matches can only accommodate 13,823 Korona fans and 777 visiting fans. However, on one occasion the stadium was full to capacity during a league match. This occurred during the 2006/2007 season when fans of visiting club Legia Warszawa were prohibited from entering due to the vast number of their 'red brigade' supporters who made the trip down to watch their club in Kielce.

Pitch dimensions are 105 x 68 m, and the entire surface is heated. Automatic sprinklers water the pitch in between match days. Kielce stadium has a complete system of monitoring, which could serve as a model for other Polish stadiums. Korona's stadium is also considered by the Polish Football Association for international games.

Since 2006, when the club moved to the most modern stadium in Poland, it often had among the best attendance statistics in the Polish league, although these numbers have declined since the club's relegation at the end of the 2007/08 season.

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