Previously, an appraisal carried out by external specialists on the Happel stadium lawn, where a hole about 20 centimeters deep had appeared in the match against Denmark on Monday, had been sent to UEFA.
It read that the investigations did not discover any other cavities under the lawn. More than 45,000 tickets have been sold for the game against the world champion. The final training sessions for both teams can also take place on Thursday in the Happel Stadium.
Hole in the lawn as a signal
According to association president Gerhard Milletich, despite the permission to play, the ÖFB found itself in an extremely uncomfortable situation, after all, the hole against Denmark made headlines around the world. “We are only passengers here, but we have damage to our image,” Milletich told APA. The City of Vienna acts as the stadium owner, the ÖFB is a tenant.
The hole and the power failure before the Denmark match brought back awareness of the condition of the Happel Stadium. The ÖFB has been trying to find a new national stadium for years, but so far in vain. Milletich sees the hole in the lawn as a “signal that you should take to think about what to do with the stadium”. The construction of a new arena is “a question of political will”.
Experts from the City of Vienna and UEFA had been examining the stadium’s lawn since Tuesday. The hole could have formed due to the previous heavy rain, it was said before the meeting of ÖFB, UEFA and stadium operator Wiener Sportstätten Betriebsgesellschaft mbH on Wednesday evening.
Experts have been working on behalf of the Wiener Sportstätten since Tuesday to get to the bottom of the unusual lawn problem. First of all, the technical components such as the irrigation system, turf heating, drainage and the main rainwater sewer, which crosses the pitch at about the same level as the hole and was scanned with a camera after cleaning, were checked. Everything tight, the check revealed. “From our point of view, a technical failure of a built-in part can be ruled out,” explained Manfred Faly, spokesman for the Viennese sports facilities, to the APA.
Expert companies inspected lawns
In addition, the damaged area around the hole was excavated and sent to an expert, who also ruled out a technical defect. It is therefore assumed that the heavy rain of up to 50 liters per square meter led to a rise in the groundwater level due to the nearby Danube and thus to the formation of a cavity.
The hole was closed and to rule out further cavities, the turf was examined on Wednesday using magnetic resonance imaging and ground-penetrating radar. Two expert companies covered the entire 8,000 square meters with their devices, and the data should be evaluated by the evening, explained Faly. In the event that further damage should arise, all the necessary materials including the turf are on site and usable immediately.
Source: Nachrichten
