Irish Sports jumps into the 21st century tonight

One thing I will never do is knock the stadium......it's state of the art......fair play to the irfu and fai.

49k tickets sold 120 short of capcity. The FAI always set aside a small number of tickets to look after kids whose parents would not be able to attend matches. I think the FAI draw their supporters from the working class in Ireland probably the same with hurling while other sports are middle class and upper.

Propably a reasonable stadium for soccer,may well be in the top 20 stadia in Europe.Certainly wouldnt compare with Arsenal,United,Barcelona,Milan,Madrid,Paris even Croke Park.Theres propably plenty more i dont even remember off hand.There should be good fun when the rugby starts up there when the person taking penaltys and conversions into one end will be faced with a glass background and a whole host of vertical poles as a backdrop making it nigh on impossible to actually pick out the goalposts in daylight.The unfortunate kicker will be faced with a large shaft of daylight coming through this glass monstrosity and it will be like the goalposts are thrown against scaffolding,how is he going to pick out the posts.

The gotchee-Seeing that you were responsible for single handedly chasing Stamford Bridge from this forum with your mindless abuse and constant faultfinding,its quite possible that somebody  as challenged in the grey matter department as myself,is Albert Einstein compared to a clown like yourself.I think we will find that your sole claim to fame in life is hunting down somebody who you didnt even know on a forum,because he was recognised as an authority on racing and you were recognised as a fool who could only write rubbish and then put a smiley face at the end of it.

Jimeen it's not fear to compare Croker to those other international venues or stadia, it's just not fair on the old lady, i actually feel for her as the Lansdowne is an iconic stadia in the heart of the city, when people think of Dublin they will think of the new Lansdowne not Croker and i know that kills good GAA men like you and me, it kinda eats you inside !!!! Anyway i think it is like comparing Ann Doyle to Rosanna Davidson. We all love Ann but no matter how much make up she puts on she not as naturally beautiful as Rossana and the fact she is older and more dated well..... The future is the new Lansdowne. By the way i hear these tours of Croker have been a disaster no one wants to see the old lady

Laughable capacity, poor facilities location inside, some dangerous locations inside the ground imo.
2 absolutely farcical opening games, hope they don't bring bad luck to the stadium forever. The ticket
prices for internationals of rugby and soccer football would make your eyes water. Been a bad week
all round, Shelbourne Rovers and the league representative team have brought embarrassment to domestic
soccer with their inept performances....not a good week for soccer football when you compare it to the
week it was for Gaelic football.

Compare the prices for internationals to what was on offer in Croke Park Saturday, 25 euro for 2
unbelievable games. Thank God for the GAA and their cathedral. Shows what can be done when things
are organised properly.

And as the BBC said:

"
The shape is a little like a giant bed-pan. It may be difficult for rugby players to see the posts
against the small glassy north stand.

The capacity is 30,000 less than the magnificent Gaelic games stadium, Croke Park, which the Irish
rugby and football teams were forced to borrow while their new home was being built."

The description of the stadium as a giant bed pan is quite apt, as the FAI don't have a pot to
piss in.

RF strikes another blow for anyone with an inferiority complex.Just enjoy it for what it is without always trying to measure up.

Great to have the Aviva, congrats to the FAI and IRFU and everyone else involved.

whatsthewordjohannesburg

How angry can one person get, People pay the going pricce if they think some is value for money. We have seen this countless times during the summer in the GAA. Anyway my cousin was in China yesterday some radom guy asked where he was from he said Ireland and quick as a flash they guy says ah the Aviva. The stadium is so amazing when people think of Ireland they will think of the new Lansdowne Road the real national stadium

Oh my you are angry amazing what the mention of the new landsdowne road does to the forum bigots.

We're number 1 baby and it's finished

Ricky,

I think from recent visits to Croke Park and other staduims around the world, it's fair to say Croke Park can't compete with these modern stadiums (Wembley, Nou Camp, New Lansdowne Road)
Many areas of the staduim appear run down, and need upgrading.
This brings to mind why the entire staduim wasn't built at the same time. As opposed to building it one stand at a time, because the GAA didn't want to take games out of the capital !!!!
Also as the stadium, is not a bowl. The hill end looks very poor when compared to the rest of the stadium. Its like we built 3 stands and just left one of the ends behind the goal.

The Pitch can be very poor in Croker illustrating by so many of our great players not being able to hold their footing Dubs v Wexford a perfect example.

The Hill which is a terrace, is unsafe not sure how someone has not been seriously hurt.

Gererally, the stands look drewry. The origional blue seating has turned to gray, there is a green mould growing on the roof of the Cusack Stand and the Canal End to a lesser extent. It's in bad need of a make over.

Sightlines don't go there ! [:(]

The staduim may hold 82,000. But with the trend of attendances this year, it may only be full twice for GAA games(them being the AIl finals). More games should be played at provincial venues. As one high ranking GAA official said to me The new Lansdowne should have 82k and us 50k would be perfect and we would have some atmosphere at games.

I think the GAA needs to seriouly look at updating or moving to Clondalkin or a Bertie Bowl type stadium on the outskirts of Dublin.

740 posts on Hoganstand.com from "Joseff".

Being honest, I think you have a very serious problem.

Good article about Wednesday night.

The Extra Yard
Extratime.ie's panel of Feature writers take a different look at the Airtricity League
Why can't LoI win friends & influence people
by Simon O'Gorman
Thu, Aug 05 2010
No-one expected the Airtricity representative XI to beat Manchester United in the Aviva Stadium's first football match on Wednesday night. And while the 1-7 scoreline was hardly a ringing endorsement of the domestic league, it made a cruel kind of sense when the context of the two teams was honestly explored.

Damien Richardson, the manager of the Irish side, was right when he said that the result counted for nothing. Practically speaking it was just another one of those meaningless pre- season friendlies. There was nothing material at stake and nothing as such to be gained by either side.

Everybody knew this. So why then, with such an unthreatening background, was the Airtricity XI v Manchester United such a dispiriting experience?

Perhaps it had something to do with the enforced party atmosphere. The Aviva Stadium is now open for business but if the domestic league had one hand on the scissors as the ribbon was cut there was little doubt that our invitation owed more to good manners than a burning desire for our company. No-one really wanted us to be there and this was no where more apparent than in the RTE studio.

Chairman Bill could scarcely conceal his irritation at the evening’s obligations and, having recently struggled through a graceless World Cup, this new task of analysing a league he knows nothing about sorely tested his patience.

Richard Sadlier, drafted temporarily into the A team, was expected to somehow represent the League of Ireland and dig out the big boys with a bit of much needed local knowledge but under Bill's accusatory glare he succumbed to the evidence that was in front of us all. He was on a hiding to nothing but did make the most pertinent point of the evening; how can anyone expect the domestic league to compete in such an environment when too few people pay to go and watch it?

John Giles spent the evening in a state of benign confusion, like a favoured relative attending his granddaughters hip hop gig. Giles has been there and done that but limited his contribution to vague observations on the inequality of the teams and the oddness of the atmosphere and in doing so he was tickling the belly of the elephant in the room.

The Aviva Stadium, Ireland's brand new football stadium, was full of Manchester United fans. Fathers from Inchicore, Phibsboro, Santry and Sligo brought their sons and daughters to worship at the altar of the Red Devils, unaware and uncaring that the other team were in fact their next door neighbours.

In this age of multi-culturalism it is not a disheartening thing to hear a packed national stadium cheering a team from another country. But it is savagely disappointing to hear the cheer against a team from their own country.

In the wider context, this event will not cost the domestic league a single supporter at this weekend's league programme. Not one. But nor will it lure a single red shirted football fan to the stands at Terryland Park, The Carlisle Grounds or Turners Cross. Perhaps, as Richard Sadlier suggested, this was an opportunity lost but in reality did such an opportunity ever really exist? The fracture between the Irish football public and Irish domestic football is profound. Would one single person have been persuaded to attend a League of Ireland game if the result had been any different? And if they had come, would they have stayed?

Wednesday night's game showed us a huge community of football fans who have not only voted to support another league, but have done so to the absolute exclusion of the league that struggles to survive in their own towns and cities. As a nation we love football but so many of us want it wrapped up in gold or not at all.

There is no revelation here. But for anyone who was confused by the emptiness that permeated Wednesday night's game it is worth bearing in mind that it lifted the rock on a football community that has emphatically rejected its own and reminded those of us that cannot imagine supporting a team that we could not go and watch that we are members of an overwhelmed minority. And that is almost unbearably sad.

the writer of that article seems to forget league of ireland is shhit and watching it would be like jabbing a fork in your eye . utd were walking through through them ffs .

lads ffs as i have said many times why do ye bother, though ricky that hoganstand thread is amusing alright.

Chinaman "ah the Aviva" !!!

Great spot Ricky Butcher.....Rocketknickers shame on you.....Did you move from Tallaght to Drogheda.

I suppose people like in all these stadiums that your much closer to the action. I think thats another major drawback to Croker, again it's the way the stadium was designed and built.