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Molineux Stadium ( ) is a Championship football stadium situated in Wolverhampton, England. It has been the home ground of Wolverhampton Wanderers Football Club since 1889, and has a long and illustrious history as the first 'new build' stadium in Football League history, one of the first grounds in the country to install floodlights, as well as hosting some of the first European club games in the 1950s. At the time of its multimillion-pound renovation in the early 1990s, Molineux was one of the biggest and most modern stadia in England, though it has since been eclipsed by many other ground developments. The stadium has however hosted England internationals and, more recently, England under-21 internationals, as well as the first UEFA Cup Final in 1972. Although currently a 31,000 seater stadium, the record attendance at Molineux stands at 61,315. Initial plans were announced in May 2010 to rebuild two sides of the stadium by the 2014–15 season to increase capacity to around 36,000. The first stage of this project began in Summer 2011 and was completed on course for the start of the 2012–13 season. There are also provisional future plans for a longer term redevelopment of every stand that could potentially create a 50,000 capacity. ==Stadium== The stadium is located a few hundred yards north of Wolverhampton city centre, at the far side of the city's ring road, and is a prominent building due to its size in an area with predominantly low-rise buildings. It consists of four stands: the Steve Bull Stand (formerly the John Ireland stand), the Sir Jack Hayward Stand (formerly the Jack Harris stand), the Stan Cullis Stand and the Billy Wright Stand. Both the Billy Wright and Stan Cullis stands feature statues of each man in front of them. The total seated capacity of the stands is approximately 31,500, with a temporary seating area lifting the present official capacity to 31,700. The current stadium design stems from the early 1990s when it was extensively redeveloped to become a modern all-seater venue in accordance with the Taylor Report, which required British football stadia to provide seating for all those attending. In the days before seating regulations, the ground could hold more than 60,000 spectators; the record attendance for a match at the ground is 61,315 for a Football League First Division game against Liverpool on 11 February 1939. The 1940s and 1950s saw average attendances for seasons regularly exceed 40,000, coinciding with the club's peak on the field. Molineux has hosted England internationals. The first was a 6–1 win over Ireland on 7 March 1891. England again beat Ireland, this time 4–0, on 14 February 1903 and lost to Wales 2–1 on 5 February 1936. The last was a 5–2 defeat of Denmark in a 1958 World Cup qualifier on 5 December 1956. It has also hosted three England under-21 internationals (in 1996, 2008 and 2014) and, in 2005, hosted some European Youth Championship qualifying matches. On 24 June 2003, Molineux also became Wolverhampton's biggest live concert venue, with Bon Jovi performing in front of 34,000 people. Up until May 2011, the ground had a capacity of 29,400. However the 5,500 Stan Cullis Stand was knocked down for redevelopment and 230 seats in the lower tier of the Steve Bull Stand were taken out as part of the process taking temporary capacity down to 23,670. The lower tier of the new North Bank (holding 4,000) was opened for use in September 2011 for the team's second home game of the season, which took the stadium capacity up to 27,670. The upper tier on the new stand (3,700 seats) was completed by the start of the 2012-13 season, taking the overall capacity of the stadium up to 31,700.〔 However the club have delayed the second phase of the redevelopment in rebuilding the Steve Bull Stand. For both the 2012-13 and 2013-14 seasons in the Championship and League One respectively, the South-West Corner (holding 875) has been closed. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Molineux Stadium」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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