It is said that another name for the stadium, the Theater of Dreams, was coined by Sir Bobby Charlton, the legend and icon of the Manchester United club. “Manchester United has been playing home games here for more than 100 years. Each of these matches is a spectacle, which makes fans and tourists from all over the world want to be a part of. George Best’s brilliant feints, Eric Cantona’s obnoxious antics, David Beckham’s jewel-like passes across the field – the actors of the Dream Theater have always known how to give the audience a real holiday.
The players behaved like Hollywood stars off the field. Scandalized George Best spent all his money on women, booze and sports cars, and his adventures were for years a favorite subject of the British tabloids. David Beckham became a style icon, forever changing the image of the soccer player in the public eye. These men and their stories have raised the popularity of the club and the stadium to the sky. So it is no wonder that to visit Old Trafford is a dream even for visitors to the Foggy Albion who are totally indifferent to soccer, putting the legendary stadium on a par with such sights of England as Big Ben and Canterbury Cathedral.
History of Old Trafford Stadium
In 1909, Manchester United FC wins the FA Cup, thus earning themselves a new stadium. Then the new director of Manchester United, John Henry Davies, allocated 60,000 pounds to build a grand stadium with a capacity of 100,000 people. However, due to lack of budget stadium project took more modest size – a capacity of 80 thousand spectators.
Already in 1910 at the new spacious home field of the club held its debut game, in which Manchester United was defeated.
With the beginning of aerial bombardment in 1941, the main South Stand is in ruins. It took more than eight years to rebuild the stadium, while the club’s team had to play on the pitch of Manchester City FC, direct rivals. In 1949, the restored stands at Old Trafford gathered more than 40 thousand spectators to see their favorite team play in their home stadium.
Soon Manchester United’s fortunes improved. In 1951, the canopy over the South Stand was reconstructed, and by 1959, all the stands in the stadium received a canopy. In addition, modern floodlights shone on Old Trafford.
In the 1970s, the old mechanical scoreboard was replaced by an electronic scoreboard, more than 5,000 seats were added, and in the South Stand organized an office building with a panoramic restaurant.
In the 1990s, the grandstands were reorganized into fully seated stands (before that, only the South Stand had seating). And the 1995 expansion allowed the North Grandstand to be rebuilt and added upper tiers to the rest of the grandstands. Before 2006, second tiers were also added to the quadrants of the stadium, increasing the capacity to 75811 seats.