Schalke’s iconic 62,000-seater stadium once hosted the UEFA Cup final before being left to rot. The first leg of the 1997 UEFA Cup final between Schalke 04 and Inter Milan was held at the Parkstadion in Gelsenkirchen, Germany.
The German side won the opening game 1-0. And few today will remember how they beat Inter on penalties in Italy after drawing 1-1 on aggregate, as we look ahead to Wednesday night’s modern iteration of the same fixture – the Europa League final between Freiburg and Aston Villa.
But unlike Wednesday’s venue, the 42,000-seater Besiktas Park, Parkstadion was a giant of its day. Another big difference is that it is no longer used by Schalke’s first team, having been abandoned by the club after they moved to the glossy Veltins Arena in 2001.
JOIN US ON FACEBOOK! Latest news, analysis and much more on Mirror Football’s Facebook page
Parkstadion was Schalke’s home between 1973 and 2001. In 1967, Gelsenkirchen’s city council gave the go-ahead to build a large stadium and the first fixture held there was a friendly match between Schalke and Feyenoord.
Five matches were played at Parkstadion during the 1974 World Cup, which West Germany ended up winning. It also hosted two group stage matches in Euro 1998.
In between the two tournaments, Michael Jackson performed there during his Bad World Tour in 1988, while the likes of The Rolling Stones and Pink Floyd also graced it in later years.
However, by the 1990s, it had become increasingly clear the stadium was outdated. Renovations in 1998 took its capacity to 62,004 but issues such as its stands being far from the pitch and a lack of cover remained.
View 4 ImagesParkstadion was the home of Schalke from 1973 to 2001(Image: Getty)
£4.99HBO MaxGet HBO Max here
Aston Villa have reached the UEFA Europa League final where they face SC Freiburg on May 20. Fans can watch the game without a TNT Sports subscription by signing up to the HBO Max Basic With Ads plan via Prime Video’s HBO Max channel.
Schalke deemed it necessary to move to a new modern ground and construction of the Veltins Arena began at an adjacent site in 1998. The current home of the football club opened its doors three years later.
The last competitive game played at Parkstadion was in May 2001, with 65,000 people attending the game, which ended in a 5-3 win over SpVgg Unterhaching. Schalke fans celebrated wildly as they thought the win had clinched them the title, only for a last-minute Bayern Munich equaliser elsewhere to snatch it away.
View 4 ImagesThe glamorous Veltins Arena opened its doors in 2001(Image: Getty)
Following the Royal Blues’ departure, Parkstadion was left partly demolished by 2008, leaving it in a state of limbo. Even the jumbotron was donated to a stadium in German town Aue.
For years, aerial shots showed the stands lying in a derelict state compared to its prime. But Schalke later launched a major redevelopment project to transform the area into a high-tech campus for their youth academy.
Article continues below
View 4 ImagesThe old and the new stadium are close(Image: Getty)
Since 2020, it has been somewhat reconstructed, now featuring a heavily scaled-down 2,999-capacity alongside a preserved section of the original concrete terracing and a single, fan-saved floodlight mast.
It reopened its doors for competitive matches in the summer of 2020. Schalke’s Under-23 and youth academy teams have been using the historic turf as their official home ground ever since as a nod to the club’s rich history.