Millennium Stadium and Olympic Soccer

Summer Olympics Venues: Millennium Stadium
by Anthony Hopper

The 2012 London Summer Olympic Games will (officially) run from July 27 through August 12. The Olympic competitions will take place at a number of different venues located throughout Britain. One of the key Olympic sites is Millennium Stadium. All of the information on this event location comes from Millennium Stadium's official website unless otherwise noted.

Millennium Stadium's Location

According to the London Summer Olympics' official website, the Stadium is located in Cardiff, Wales. Per Royal Family History, Wales is a semi-autonomous principality in western Britain. The Olympic venue is not too far from London. Visitors can reach it from London's Heathrow Airport in about three hours using public transportation.

Lord Bute donated the site of the present day Millennium Stadium to Cardiff in the 1800s. Per the Welsh Rugby Union, the location has been the home of Wales' national rugby team since 1884. The first stadium on the site was called Cardiff Arms Park. It hosted the Welsh national rugby team's home games until it was torn down in the 1990s to make way for Millennium Stadium. Construction began on the stadium in 1997 and was completed in 1999.

About the Stadium

Millennium Stadium contains 74,500 seats. It has a retractable roof, which allows games to be played in any weather. The stadium is the home of Wales' national rugby team; however, it also hosts a variety of other events, including soccer matches, motorsports races, rock concerts, and trade shows.

Interesting Facts about Millennium Stadium

-It took 40,000 tons of concrete and 16,000 tons of steel to build the stadium.

-The stadium contains almost twice as many liquor outlets, 27, as it does food and beverage outlets, 15.

-The stadium is equipped with 1512 public address speakers, weighing a total of 10 tons. They require 61 kilometers (37.9 miles) worth of cables.

-Approximately 10 million people walked through the stadium's turnstiles in its first decade of existence.

-It was the first stadium in Great Britain to be equipped with a fully-retractable roof.

-Per the London Summer Olympics' official website, Millennium Stadium will host the Olympics' first event, a soccer match, on Wednesday July 25. The game will take place two days before the Summer Olympics officially begin.

Millennium Stadium and the 2012 London Summer Olympics

According to an article in The Telegraph, Millennium Stadium will host five men's and six women's Olympic soccer matches between Wednesday, July 25 (two days before the official start of the Summer Olympics) and Friday, August 10.

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