Silvio Piola Stadium in Novara, Italy

In 1964 planning for a new stadium in Novara started and construction works began in 1971. On January 22 1976 the stadium with an initial capacity of 25,000 spectators has been opened. The first match to be played was Novara Calcio against Juventus Turin. In October 1997 the city of Novara decided to change the name of the stadia – formerly known as Viale Kennedy – towards Silvio Piola in order to honour the Football World Champion from 1938 who played in Novara between 1947 and 1954. In the season 2009/2010 the club got promoted to Serie B and now had to modernize the stadium in order to meet security requirements. In October 2010 the new field of ‘Silvio Piola’ with a synthetic surface has been presented. In close proximity to the stadia other sports facilities including a Baseball Field, Tennis Courts and a track and field arena have been installed.