Stadium
Rovers played their first matches at Steeles Field in Birkenhead but, in 1887, they bought a new site from Tranmere Rugby Club. The ground was variously referred to as the "Borough Road Enclosure", "Ravenshaw's Field" and "South Road". The name "Prenton Park" was adopted in 1895 as a result of a suggestion in the letters page of the Football Echo. Because the land was required for housing and a school, Tranmere were forced to move and the name went with them. The present Prenton Park was opened on 9 March 1912. There were stands (also known as bleachers) on both sides of the pitch, a paddock and three open terraces, the general format which remained until 1994.
Many improvements to the ground were driven by changes in legislation. The biggest change of all took place during 1994 and 1995. The Taylor Report suggested that all stadia in the top two divisions of English football should no longer permit standing. The club's response was to redevelop three sides of the ground with entirely new all-seater stands created – the Borough Road Stand (now the Johnny King Stand), the Cowshed and the new Kop, in addition to the existing Main Stand. Capacity in the ground thus increased from 14,200 to the 16,567 of today. On 11 March 1995, the new ground was officially opened at a cost of £3.1 million.
Attendances at the ground have fluctuated over its hundred year history. Around 8,000 visitors watched the first game at the stadium, as Tranmere beat Lancaster Town 8–0. Prenton Park's largest-ever crowd was 24,424 for a 1972 FA Cup match between Tranmere and Stoke City. In 2010, an average of 5,000 fans attended each home game.
Read more about this topic: Tranmere Rovers F.C.
Famous quotes containing the word stadium:
“It’s no accident that of all the monuments left of the Greco- Roman culture the biggest is the ballpark, the Colosseum, the Yankee Stadium of ancient times.”
—Walter Wellesley (Red)
“The final upshot of thinking is the exercise of volition, and of this thought no longer forms a part; but belief is only a stadium of mental action, an effect upon our nature due to thought, which will influence future thinking.”
—Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914)
“In their eyes I have seen
the pin men of madness in marathon trim
race round the track of the stadium pupil.”
—Patricia K. Page (b. 1916)