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The Mestalla stadium first opened to football fans on the 20th May 1923 with Valencia hosting local rivals Levante UD in the inaugural match. With an initial capacity of 17,000, Estadio de Mestalla replaced Valencia’s first home, Algirós which lacked the necessary facilities to propel Los Murciélagos (The Bats) onto the centre stage of Spanish football. Unfortunately the Spanish Civil war put the brakes on any progress for the club, and Mestalla was used as a concentration camp and storage facility meaning that the stadium became into a state of disrepair until the early 1940s. After a lot of renovations, Valencia won their first cup title in 1941 with the Copa del Rey after defeating Espanyol, followed by a succession of three league titles and two further league cups. With this onward momentum, the club drew up plans for expansion dubbed “Gran Mestalla” which took the capacity up to 45,000 in the 1950s before another disaster befell the club, in the form of a flood, when the nearby Turia River’s banks burst in 1957. Once the club restored the pitch, the next decades were characterised by consistent, small improvements and a new bottom tier to accommodate more fans for the 1982 World Cup. Since the 1970s Valencia’s management have always flirted with the idea of relocating the stadium to a new site, but plans have been thwarted by adverse economic conditions and lack of investment. Rather farcically, Los Che have begun to construct a Nou Mestalla with an expected capacity of 75,000 but the project has been temporarily abandoned with the basic concrete structure very much a proverbial elephant in the room. Still, the current Mestalla is the fifth largest stadium in Spain, and continues to host important matches such as 2011 and 2014 Copa del Rey final, both contested by Barca and Real Madrid, Los Merengues.

DRIVING As there are endless places you can drive to get to the Estadio, I can’t possible cover all routes and journey suggestions! The address for satnav is as follows: Avenida Suecia s/n, 46010 Valencia Car Parks Situated in a dense urban neighbourhood, parking at the stadium is severely limited with the closest good sized car park appearing to be at the nearby University. Unfortunately Valencia’s official website doesn’t confirm if this is suitable for football fans or not. TRAIN The main train station in Valencia is known as Estación del Norte (Spanish) or Estació del Nord (Valencian) and is situated next to the Plaza de Toros which is the city’s bull killing arena. Around 2km West of the Stadium, as stated above you can walk to the ground in 20 minutes or either choose to take a taxi (outside station), Metro (lines 3 and 5), or bus (Number 10 in Ayuntamiento square, opposite station) depending on what way you are inclined. METRO Like a lot of Spanish cities, the metro is a pretty cheap and efficient way of getting around town, with the Aragón stop, on line number 5 probably being the closest to the stadium. Remember if you aren’t at a station which is on line number 5 then just transfer across to it and work out how many stops it will be. There are maps at every station and inside carriages. BUS The number 80 is a popular bus for Valencianistas looking to get to the game. It departs from the main bus station which is based on Aragón Avenue and will drop you off right outside Mestalla Stadium. AIRPORTS The main airport of Valencia is Manises which lies 12km West of the football stadium. Serving over 5 million passengers a year across 15 European countries, Manises Airport is the 8th busiest in Spain and full of everyone’s “favourite” cheap airline providers. Once you touch down on Spanish soil you can get to the city either via the A-3 Autovía motorway, the Metrobus or Aerobus which will take you anywhere between 20-40 minutes depending on the number of stops or the old faithful metro service with lines 3 or 5 doing the job adequately.