Stadium History
Its field is used mainly for football games by Torpedo Moscow club, who also own the sports complex, and Spartak Moscow. It is also one of the few major European stadia to use an artificial pitch, as it installed a FIFA-approved FieldTurf pitch in 2002. The pitch is necessary for the cold Russian climate, as regular grass pitches are often destroyed during a typical winter and must be replaced at high cost. However, a temporary natural grass pitch was installed for the 2008 Champions League Final .
The Grand Arena of the Central Lenin Stadium was the chief venue for the 1980 Summer Olympics, the spectator capacity being 103,000 at that time. The events hosted in this stadium were the Opening and Closing Ceremonies, Athletics, Football finals, and the Individual Jumping Grand Prix.
The stadium hosted the 1999 UEFA Cup Final in which Parma defeated Marseille in the second UEFA Cup to be played as a single fixture.
The Luzhniki Stadium was chosen by UEFA to host the 2008 UEFA Champions League Final won by Manchester United who beat Chelsea in the first all English Champions League Final on May 21. Prior to the match some skeptics questioned the state of the pitch and also the ability of Russian authorities to keep order amongst the traveling British fans, however the match passed incident free and a British Embassy in Moscow spokesman said, "The security and logistical arrangements put in place by the Russian authorities have been first-rate, as has been their cooperation with their visiting counterparts from the UK."
The 2018 FIFA World Cup has been awarded to Russia and the Luzhniki Stadium has been selected by the Russia 2018 FIFA World Cup bid as the venue for the final which will be held on July 8, 2018. The stadium will then join Rome's Stadio Olimpico, Munich's Olympic Stadium and London's Wembley Stadium as the only stadia to have hosted the finals of the FIFA World Cup, UEFA's European Cup/Champions League and featured as a main stadium of the Summer Olympic Games.
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