>> The stadium in Morocco will accommodate 115,000 spectators/Courtesy Populous/Oualolou + Choi
The 2030 World Cup finals are five years and 11 months away. And finally, the project of the stadium that hopes to host the match was presented.
Grand Stade Hassan II football stadium in Morocco – one of the three countries hosting the tournament along with Spain and Portugal – designers Oualolou + Choi and Populous are positioned as potentially “the largest football stadium in the world” with a planned capacity of 115,000 spectators. This is reported by CNN.
The stadium will be located on an area of 100 hectares (approximately 247 acres) in El Mansouria, a town north of Casablanca, and its design, according to Populous, resembles a “mussem,” a type of traditional public tent. The Grand Stade roof will be made of an aluminum grid, which will cover both the fans inside the stadium and the tiered gardens on the outside of the stands, as well as the botanical garden on the first floor.
According to Tariq Oualalu, the chief designer and founding partner of Oualalou + Choi, “the design is deeply rooted in Moroccan culture, with its traditions and modern forms of expression,” he wrote in a press release.
It is rooted in ancient and primitive images: the museum, the tent and the garden, as well as the topography and landscapes of Morocco.
The configuration seems to be designed specifically for the FIFA World Cup events: the stands themselves will be divided into areas for fans general access at each end (capacity of about 30,000 people each), while the main section will be dedicated to boxes, hospitality, VIPs and VVIPs, according to the press release.
“(It) will be a truly iconic, iconic venue for Morocco and for football itself, which will be one of the biggest stadiums in the world,” said Christopher Lee, EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa) managing director of Populous.
So how will Hassan II Grand Stadium stack up against other stadiums with incredible capacity?
The largest cricket stadium boasts the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad, India, which has increased its capacity to 132,000 in 2021, while the largest American football stadium is the NCAA's Michigan Wolverines Stadium, which holds over 107,000 fans. .
The largest football stadium in the world is multi-purpose and one of the most difficult to access in the world: Rungrado 1 Travnia Stadium in Pyongyang, North Korea. Opened in 1989, it officially has a capacity of 150,000, although following renovations in the 2010s, Stadium Database conducted a study which found that the stadium now holds just 114,000 fans.
Coincidence that the Grande Stade Hassan II will have 1,000 more seats? Maybe not.
Populous is no stranger to the construction of large sports facilities: it was behind the Tottenham Hotspur and Emirates stadiums in London, a dozen Olympic venues and other stadiums around the world.
After five unsuccessful bids to host the World Cup, Morocco finally got its chance when FIFA announced in October 2023 that the country would co-host the 2030 finals with Spain and Portugal in an unusual, extended tournament that would also include one memorable match each in Uruguay, Argentina and Paraguay on the occasion of the centenary of the FIFA World Cup.
The Grand Stade Hassan II design team says the stadium will “fully meet FIFA requirements” and will have the “opportunity to host the final” of the 2030 World Cup; A final decision on which FIFA site will be chosen has yet to be made, although Real Madrid's recently renovated Santiago Bernabéu stadium is expected to be the favourite.
Preparations for earthworks at the site outside Casablanca are already underway has begun, say Oualolou + Choi and Populous, so we should expect the implementation of this grandiose project in the coming years.