Манчестер Ситидің бұрынғы «Мейн Роуд» стадионы

Former stadium of Manchester City

Maine Road was a football stadium in Moss Side, Manchester, England, that was home to Manchester City Football Club from 1923 to 2003. It hosted FA Cup semi finals, the Charity Shield, a League Cup final and England matches. Maine Road's highest attendance of 84,569 was set in 1934 at an FA Cup sixth round match between Manchester City and Stoke City, a record for an English club ground. At the time of its closure in 2003, Maine Road was an all seater stadium with a capacity of 35,150 and of haphazard design with stands of varying heights due to the ground being renovated several times over its 80 year history. The following season Manchester City moved to the City of Manchester Stadium in east Manchester, a mile from the city centre and near Ardwick, where the club originally formed in 1880.

Plans to build Maine Road were first announced in May 1922, following a decision by Manchester City to leave their Hyde Road ground, which did not have room for expansion and its main stand had been severely damaged by fire in 1920. Two sites in Belle Vue in east Manchester were suggested, but neither was deemed sufficient. To many City fans east Manchester was regarded as City's home and a move to Belle Vue seemed right. But the site was just and an available lease of fifty years was deemed too short by the club, so it was decided that City would move to Moss Side. The move to a larger stadium at Maine Road was backed by then manager Ernest Mangnall. Many were disappointed when a site in south Manchester was chosen. A City director, John Ayrton, resigned from the board later in the decade and helped to form a breakaway club, Manchester Central, which played at Belle Vue.

A 16.25 acre former brickworks on Maine Road was purchased for £5,500. The road was originally known as Dog Kennel Lane but renamed Maine Road (after the Maine law) during the 1870s at the insistence of the Temperance movement which owned land on Dog Kennel Lane and the local authority accepted its request. During construction, the stadium was reputedly cursed by a Gypsy when officials evicted a Gypsy camp from the area. This curse was allegedly removed on 28 December 1998. However, the Gypsy curse is likely to be an urban myth, as such stories are endemic to a number of Football League grounds. Construction took 300 days at a total cost of £100,000.

The first match at Maine Road took place on 25 August 1923 when 58,159 fans watched Manchester City beat Sheffield United 2–1. The first changes to the ground took place in 1931, when the corner between the Main Stand and the Platt Lane end at the south of the ground was rebuilt to incorporate a roof. (A larger crowd of 121,919 attended the Crystal Palace ground when it hosted the 1913 FA Cup Final between Aston Villa and Sunderland.) Queues formed four hours before the match, and one journalist stated that Maine Road was packed two hours before kick off. Further changes were planned, but suspended when Manchester City were relegated from the First Division in 1938 and abandoned when World War II broke out. The highest attendance for a league game at Maine Road occurred during this period, when 83,260 people watched Manchester United play Arsenal on 17 January 1948. This figure is a national record for a league game. Maine Road was also used by Manchester United to host three of their four home games in the 1956–57 European Cup, until floodlights were installed at Old Trafford as required by UEFA.

Floodlights for the stadium were installed in 1953 and further development took place in 1957. This was prompted by the hosting of two FA Cup semi finals in successive years, the side facing the Main Stand (which until that time was generally known as the Popular Side) was redeveloped and named The Kippax after a nearby street. Over the course of the 1960s and 1970s, the Kippax became the part of the ground where the club's most vociferous fans congregated. against Chelsea for a 2–2 draw. Immediately before demolition, the capacity of the Kippax terrace was 18,300. The revamp of the Kippax was the second phase of a five part development plan that would have cost £40million and increased the stadium's capacity to 45,024. However, the club abandoned these plans as City were relegated from the Premier League in 1996 and from Division One two years later. and a crowd of 34,957, about 100 short of maximum capacity, filled Maine Road for the final day. City lost the match 1–0 with Michael Svensson scoring the stadium's last goal. The final match was followed by performances by musical acts Badly Drawn Boy and Doves. City's final goal at the stadium was scored on 21 April 2003 by Marc Vivien Foé during a 3–0 victory over Sunderland. Forty five days later, Fóe died on 26 June from an undetected heart condition while representing the Cameroon national football team during the 2003 Confederations Cup. An auction of the ground's fixtures and fittings took place in July 2003, raising £100,000, which was donated to community projects in the Moss Side area, which was undergoing a lengthy regeneration process. The two penalty spots and the centre spot were thought to be the most desired mementos, but all three had been cut out from the grass before the auction took place. The auction lasted for seven hours and 1,000 supporters attended the auction, with interest from clubs such as Preston North End and Norwich City for the bigger lots which could be reused.

Towards the end of Maine Road's lifespan there were proposals for other sports teams to make use of the stadium following City's relocation; Stockport County once expressed interest in moving there from Edgeley Park, and in December 2000 Sale Sharks rugby union club was offered a lease for the stadium. However, none of the proposals came to fruition and some past City players stated their dismay at the stadium not being renovated for a mixed use sports stadium. Demolition began in late 2003, lasting around 10 months. Two years later approval was given for a new housing development to be built on the site, consisting of 474 homes. There is a public art display commemorating the stadium and features a circular plate half open, symbolising the centre spot and the new emerging development which now sits on the Maine Road stadium.

For long periods of its history Maine Road had the widest pitch in England. However, the width was changed several times by managers wishing to alter the pitch size to suit their style of play. In the final season before the ground was closed, the pitch size was 107 x 71 metres (116.5 x 78 yards). Maine Road's replacement, the City of Manchester Stadium, has maintained this tradition of having a large pitch.

Maine Road also gives its name to a non league football club, Maine Road FC. The club, who currently play in the North West Counties Football League Division One, was founded by a group of Manchester City supporters in 1955. The club previously based its headquarters at the social club adjoining Maine Road.