ISL 2014: Salt Lake is finally 'fatafati' and ready for football-mad Kolkata

Kolkata: In proudly stating Salt Lake stadium’s capacity, we often forget that one of the largest stadiums in the world had no seating — enabling it to allow more than 100,000 people during Kolkata derbies and special friendlies featuring the likes of Oliver Kahn and Lionel Messi.

Today, the seating may have been reduced to 68,000, but football fans in the city are not worried at all — because, a reduced capacity means proper seating facilities and ’elbow room’ that allows spectators to enjoy the action on the field without the fear of falling over each other.

It may sound like a jibe at India’s most prestigious stadium, but the fact was that Salt Lake was always about quantity more than quality. However, with the Indian Super League and the 2017 World Cup coming up, it has got a much-needed facelift.

Labourers are working day and night to ensure that the arena is ready to stage the ISL opener between Atletico de Kolkata and Mumbai City FC — with some seating areas still left empty but most of the primary galleries are now adorned with blue seats. The empty areas are a bit of an eyesore and there will be people who will have to sit on the usual concrete — but it still promises to be much more comfortable than before.

We tried sitting in a few areas on the stadium — concrete and bucket seats — and the latter not only offers the comfort that you expect at a sports stadium, but also a better and more elevated view which will stop fans from constantly standing up or craning their necks to watch play.

Two massive LED screens have also been installed on either end of the stadiums — which also sees brightly lit electric billboards across the stands and around the pitch.

“International class locker rooms have been built — each for 25 players. The showers, bathrooms and fittings are all brand new. There are jacuzzi plans too,” head of stadium infrastructure and facilities Sandeepan Sarkar told Firstpost.

The hospitality boxes (which are all sold out) and the owners’ boxes are also new additions but those are temporary, he says.

“There is a lot of work which has also gone into the stadium keeping in mind the 2017 Under-17 World Cup,” Sarkar adds.

The stadium was rife with autograph hunters during Atletico de Kolkata’s evening training session — and were incredibly pleased with what they saw.

“I’ve been coming to this stadium for the last 15 years and have never seen it like this. Is this really my stadium?” says Mohun Bagan fan Bidyut Moitra.

Sarkar is proud of the work that has gone behind the refurbishment: “Work started on 5th September and really accelerated on the 28th,” he says — meaning this is just over a month’s work gone into the renovation.

The media capacity has also been increased and a new WiFi connection has been installed to enable smooth coverage of the event. The new astro-turf on which the ISL matches will take place was also installed a few months back.

A source close to the management told us that over Rs 1 crore has been spent for the upgradation — most of the money coming from Kolkata Games and Sports Pvt Ltd — the consortium which is made up of Sourav Ganguly, businessmen Harshavardhan Neotia, Sanjiv Goenka, and Utsav Parekh, as well as Atlético Madrid — and who own the Atletico de Kolkata franchise. It is understood that IMG-Reliance has also had a ‘helping hand’.

There are still a lot of finishing touches left — but Atletico de Kolkata has gone all out in making the stadium look like their own — with massive banners and flags hanging on the outside and inside of the stadium. Add their parked bus and kit-matching stands along with 68,000 football crazy fans, and you’ll have an intimidating home atmosphere.

“When you see the stadium during I-League days, you hardly realise which team’s home game is going to happen here. But right now, it looks like home,” Moitra says, clearly elated with the developments at Salt Lake.