Photo of the Day: China’s Olympic Soccer Stadium

July 25th, 2008 | by: Daryl |

Though the 2008 Olympics in Beijing will feature some beautiful ultra-modern stadia (see the Bird’s Nest and the Water Bubble, below) the soccer tournament will be played out in this. The Worker’s Stadium, built in 1959.

Not that there’s anything wrong with The Worker’s Stadium, but I think the fact that Ronaldinho and co. will be playing in a stadium that’s nearly half a century old while other sports take place in cool looking structures with cute nicknames reflects how seriously (or not) soccer is treated as an Olympic event.

The Bird’s Nest

The Water Bubble

All photos from:
The Daily Telegraph – Aerial Views of Beijing Olympic Stadiums (well worth a look)

International Football News – World Cup Blog RSS Feed

johnny

“Giant Primary Colored Contact Lens” was deemed not cute enough. Plus they noticed the green.
Lee

There will be plenty of people in the Amazing Technicolor Stadium taking footy seriously – 70,000, to be exact!
gaston

speaking of the olympics how do soccer team qualify
Sooz

gaston – here’s a link for you that explains the qualifiers http://www.fifa.com/mensolympic/qualifiers/index.html
gaston

thanks
http://black-white-and-grey.blogspot.com Linda

The Worker’s Stadium was especially renovated for the Games, even though most of the matches will not be held there. A quick glance at Wikipedia would tell you that there are a fair few venues being used, including the Bird’s Nest.