York City F.C. - Stadia

Stadia

For more details on this topic, see Fulfordgate. For more details on this topic, see Bootham Crescent.

Between 1922 and 1932, York City played their home games at Fulfordgate. York purchased the land for Bootham Crescent, a former cricket ground, in the summer of 1932, as it was closer to the club's centre of support and the railway station than Fulfordgate. Bootham Crescent was converted into a football ground; a main stand was built and a roof was erected above the Popular Stand. The ground opened on 31 August 1932. In March 1938, the ground's record attendance was set when 28,123 people watched York City play Huddersfield Town.

The ground was damaged during the Second World War when a bomb landed on housing at the Shipton Street End, but shortly after the war ended, the terracing was laid properly with concrete. At this point most of the ground was still uncovered. The stadium was fitted with floodlights in 1959, which were used for the first time in a friendly against Newcastle United on 28 October 1959.

During the mid-1980s, £300,000 was spent on a series of improvements to the Bootham Crescent ground, which was funded by money generated during York's FA Cup run in the 1984–85 season, which included games against Arsenal and then Liverpool, including a replay at Liverpool in front of a crowd of 43,000.

The improvements included building hospitality suites behind the main stand, new club offices, turnstiles, new crush barriers, and the addition of more seats to the Popular Stand, giving a seating capacity of 2,883 seats out of a total capacity of 13,185.

The capacity of Bootham Crescent had at one time been 12,475, with 3,245 seats, but this was reduced in 1994 because of an increase to the family area of the Main stand due to popular demand, and alterations to enable the ground to comply with the recommendations made in the Taylor Report. It saw 326 seats replacing a standing area, reducing capacity. Stricter rules concerning the density of people standing resulting from the Taylor Report further reduced capacity. New floodlights were installed during the summer of 1995, costing £122,000. These floodlights are twice as bright as the original floodlights, and meet the requirements for Division One football. A drainage system was installed to improve the quality of the pitch during winter, costing several thousand pounds. A water tower was also installed in the late 1990s.

York had planned a move to Huntington Stadium in 2003, but withdrew their application as they were given a loan of £2 million from the Football Stadia Improvement Fund, which secured the purchase of Bootham Crescent. In January 2005, following a sponsorship deal with Nestlé, Bootham Crescent was renamed KitKat Crescent. The ground returned to being known as Bootham Crescent after this arrangement expired in January 2010. The ground currently holds a capacity of 7,872.