Present
Murrayfield is used for most Scottish international rugby union matches, with all Scotland's Six Nations home games being played in the stadium. The stadium also hosts Edinburgh Rugby, one of Scotland's two professional sides in the Pro12 that features teams from Ireland, Wales and Italy. (For Pro12 matches, only the lower tier of the West Stand is typically used.) From 2007 to 2011, Murrayfield hosted the Edinburgh 7s, then the final event in the annual IRB Sevens World Series in rugby sevens, but that tournament was moved to Glasgow starting in 2012 due to low attendance. Murrayfield hosted select matches from the 2007 Rugby World Cup. The stadium also hosted the Heineken Cup Final in 2005, when Toulouse beat Stade Français by 18 points to 12, and again in 2009, with Leinster defeating Leicester by 19 points to 16.
Murrayfield also hosts football matches. The first football match played on Murrayfield was between the local Scottish Premier League side Heart of Midlothian F.C. (Hearts) and the Portuguese Sporting Braga in September 2004. In 2006, Hearts selected Murrayfield as their home venue for their European campaign in the 2006/2007 season, as Tynecastle did not meet the UEFA criteria for hosting European football matches. This has seen clubs such as Ferencvaros, Schalke 04 and AEK Athens playing at Murrayfield. Additionally, Hearts hosted a preseason friendly on 28 July 2007 against FC Barcelona in front of a crowd of nearly 58,000.
Although a union stadium, Murrayfield hosted the rugby league Rugby League Challenge Cup finals in 2000 and 2002 and 2003. The stadium began hosting rugby league's Super League Magic Weekend in 2009, taking over from the Millennium Stadium.
Murrayfield has played host to American football and was one of two home venues for the now defunct Scottish Claymores in the NFL Europa between 1995 and 2004, the other being Hampden Park in Glasgow. Additionally, it hosted World Bowl IV on 23 June 1996. It has been mentioned as a potential future host site for the NFL International Series, should the National Football League add future games outside the series' current permanent home, Wembley Stadium in London.
June 13th 2004, the Red Hot Chili Peppers rocked Murrayfield as part of their Roll on the Red tour. Over 70,000 people turned up to see the Red Hot Chili Peppers who were supported by N*E*R*D.
In July 2005, Murrayfield hosted the final Live 8 concert, Edinburgh 50,000 - The Final Push, with performances from the likes of James Brown, Texas & The Proclaimers.
British rock group Oasis played a sold-out show on 17 June 2009, as part of their world tour. This was the last time they would play a gig in Scotland and the second time they had played the stadium, the first being on their Standing on the Shoulder of Giants Tour in 2000. In June, 1999, The Rolling Stones played at Murrayfield on their Bridges to Babylon Tour.
It has a 100 m running track by the main stand.
The Bill McLaren Press Gallery is located at Murrayfield Stadium and the Bill McLaren Foundation was launched there on 4 March 2010.
The seats incorporate the letters "SRU" as well as a tartan pattern. This tartan is the official tartan of the SRU.
Bon Jovi performed at the stadium 22 June 2011 as part of their tour.
Pop icon Madonna performed to a sell-out crowd of 52,160 on 21 July 2012 as part of her MDNA Tour.
In October 2012, SRU chief executive Mark Dodson told the BBC that it was actively seeking a name sponsor for Murrayfield:
The single biggest piece of our inventory is our national stadium. We would like to see if we can monetise that. It would be crazy for us not to look at using our single biggest piece of inventory to drive revenue. We want to get the right price for it.
In addition, Dodson indicated that the SRU was actively seeking a site for a completely new stadium with a capacity of 10,000 to 15,000 as a future home for Edinburgh Rugby.
Read more about this topic: Murrayfield Stadium
Famous quotes containing the word present:
“There was a literary gentleman present who who had dramatised in his time two hundred and forty-seven novels as fast as they had come out—and who was a literary gentleman in consequence.”
—Charles Dickens (1812–1870)
“Women ... are degraded by the ... propensity to enjoy the present moment, and, at last, despise the freedom which they have not sufficient virtue to struggle to attain.”
—Mary Wollstonecraft (1759–1797)
“Public morning diversions were the last dissipating habit she obtained; but when that was accomplished, her time was squandered away, the power of reflection was lost, [and] her ideas were all centered in dress, drums, routs, operas, masquerades, and every kind of public diversion. Visionary schemes of pleasure were continually present to her imagination, and her brain was whirled about by such a dizziness that she might properly be said to labor under the distemper called the vertigo.”
—Sarah Fielding (1710–1768)