Football Ground Map
Football Ground Map
The World Cup might still be a few months away but already there is plenty of chatter about what awaits as the greatest show on Earth gets underway.
The football itself is discussed at length and the issues around the tournament being hosted in Qatar get a regular airing too.
What doesn't get spoken about enough is the stadiums; that is where we come in. Here we look at the stadiums of the World Cup in Qatar.
Kicking off our look at the Qatar World Cup stadiums is Al Bayt Stadium, which is the most northerly located ground in Al Khor City. The 60,000-capacity stadium, which is the second largest at the World Cup, will host Qatar's opening match of the tournament and is due to hold a total of nine matches during the World Cup including one of the semi-finals.
The design of the ground, which is the work of Dar Al-Handasah, pays homage to the Nomads with splashes of red and black amongst a sandy white background.
Next up we look at the 45,350-seater stadium known as the Education City Stadium. The reason for the name is because the ground sits within a much wider complex that includes an elite university. From a fan's perspective, the key thing they'll notice from aerial shots and, if they're lucky enough to attend, the route is the surrounds of greenery.
As for the stadium itself, the outer design is constructed from a series of geometrical shapes creating a striking appearance. Throw in the color change technology as well and the landscape is transformed as night arrives.
Al Rayyan Stadium - or the Ahmad bin Ali Stadium as it has previously been known - has been redeveloped specifically for the World Cup with the capacity roughly doubling from circa 21,000 up to around 41,000. With the previously mentioned stadium being surrounded by greenery, the landscape around Al Rayyan is perhaps more in keeping with what people expect to see in Qatar.
What does this mean? Well, let's just say the stadium nickname of 'gateway to the desert' is not a coincidence. With an eye-catching roof, which benefits from impressive illumination when dark, it's fair to say this will be a stadium that lives long in the memory of fans in attendance.
This 45,000-seater stadium is one that might be reasonably well known to football fans even before the World Cup kicks off. The ground itself has been around for a while having first been constructed in the seventies and, although it has seen extensive work to whip it into shape for the World Cup, it has played host to a few notable matches already.
England and Brazil locked horns here in 2009 whilst Liverpool lifted the Club World Cup here three years ago as well. If you're after design features then it's all about the metal framework arches that wrap over both sides of the stadium.
Ibrahim Al Jaidah is the brains behind this stadium and it's an absolute beauty but don't just take our word for that; the stadium has also bagged a win at the MIPIM AR Future Projects Award ceremony where it was recognized as the best sports facility.
From the outside, the circular stadium has a woven effect design creating patterns of circles adorned in diamond shapes whilst the birds-eye view shows a vast roof that gently peaks and softens all the way to the middle where you find a smaller than average open-air cut out. The inspiration for this ground was the Taqiyah.
Strangely, work on this stadium only began in 2018 but already it's gone through a name change. It was originally known as the Ras Abu Aboud Stadium, however, the switch to Stadium 974 came about owing to the fact the structure of the ground includes 974 shipping containers. That might sound strange but it's a fully temporary stadium, which is something that's never been seen before, and overlooks Doha port to complete the shipping theme. With a capacity of 40,000 there are a fair few punters in for a stadium experience like they've never seen before.
If we forgo the controversy of working conditions and human rights, the Al Wakrah Stadium is perhaps been the most widely ridiculed of all the Qatar 2022 World Cup grounds owing to many criticising the design when viewed from above, which is something that angered the stadium's architect Zaha Hadid. Look beyond those fairly classless digs though and the stadium is quite the attraction; the retractable roof perhaps being the key feature. The entire ground is well thought out though with nods to the maritime trade of Qatar evident throughout; from the outside it's shaped like sails and, inside, the empty seating layout forms a design of white waves on a blue background.
Last but not least we have the Lusail Stadium. The key thing to know about this ground is that it will be the stadium where someone lifts the World Cup come December. As for the stadium, it's architecture is built to tick two key boxes. The first is around the look of the stadium, which is to resemble the fanar lantern, which is something that is used across the Middle East. The second element of the design is about noise; not only will the Lusail hold 80,000 fans but the way they incline and the roof shape has been deliberately tailored to create a cauldron of noise. Bring it on.
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