History of Philips Stadion, the one and only home of PSV Eindhoven

Eindhoven - Philips Stadion 08.06.2017: The second most successful team in the history of Dutch football, PSV Eindhoven, have been playing their matches at Philips Stadion, formerly known as Philips Sportpark, since the club was founded in 1913. At first, there was merely a pitch, and in 1915 a wooden stand was added, which could hold 550 spectators. Seventeen years later, the stadium capacity was increased to 900. The Phillips Sportpark, as it was then called, became a real stadium in 1941 when it was turned into an athletics stadium with a capacity of 18,000.

The stadium was not football-only, even though PSV fans would have liked that, and as it also had a running track, it could be used for cycling and ice skating. These sports are very popular in the Netherlands even nowadays. The stadium suffered damage during the Second World War and had to be rebuilt afterwards. In 1958 the running track was removed and the stadium capacity was increased to 22,000.

Construction of stadiums, as well as other things, went forward and so did the plans for modernization of Philips Stadion. Renovation of the stadium was completed in 1977, and the stadium was then completely covered and could hold up to 26,500 spectators. Ten years later, the stadium underwent another major renovation, and was modernized in the manner of American stadiums so as to offer PSV players, fans and management more comfort in the form of restaurants, shops, offices, VIP boxes and a press centre.

PSV Eindhoven - Philips Stadion, capacity: 35 186

Foto: FLX (CC BY-SA 2.0)

In 1990 Philips Sportpark was renamed Philips Stadion and in the following years, the East and the West Stands got renovated, and new stands were built in the corners, which led to an increase in capacity to 30,000. Later, the capacity was increased to 35,000. Thanks to the ingenious design of the corner stands, the stadium looks very impressive from the outside. All these renovation works were done on the occasion of the upcoming EURO 2000, held in the Netherlands and Belgium.

'The Netherlands and Belgium made a bid for the 2018 World Cup, which would have been connected with further renovation and expansion of Philips Stadion. However, the World Cup was awarded to Russia and the plans for renovation of Phillips Stadion were thus dropped. Nevertheless, the modernization project is prepared and provides for an increase in capacity to 50,000 seats though a lower capacity is a possibility as well. Now it only remains to await the next football event, which would provide a reason for the renovation.