They don’t build stadiums like the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona/San Paolo anymore. They never really did, at least not in Europe. It is an approach more common to South America.
What is this approach? An elliptical, continuous terrace with a raised, uncovered tier overlooking it, made of concrete. There are other Italian grounds built in a similar style – Lecce’s Stadio Via del Mare, Avellino’s Stadio Partenio – but they are much smaller and only partially covered. The trend in Italy generally has been for cheaper ‘stadium’ shaped stadiums: obround arenas with straight sides and curved ends. Rectangular football grounds, traditionally referred to as ‘English-style’, used to be a rarity, which is no longer the
case.
The
Stadio del Sole (it officially became known as Stadio San Paolo in 1963) was constructed between 1952 and 1959 after the previous ground, in the hilltop district of Vomero, proved too small to accommodate SSC Napoli’s burgeoning popularity. Designed by a team led by the rationalist architect Carlo Cocchia, the new stadium had a capacity of 85,012. By comparison, the San Siro in Milan stood at around 82,000, having undergone a major overhaul in 1955. Both stadia were uncovered and had two lines of symmetry.
They also shared an aesthetic quality. Although shaped differently – one an ellipse, the other a rounded rectangle – the two grounds were constructed from reinforced concrete, with no attempt made to disguise the fact. Whereas Italian stadia built during the interwar period had hidden, quite literally, behind the façade of Italian Rationalism (which used to be Cocchia’s thing, incidentally) the San Paolo and San Siro leaned towards Brutalism.
The San Paolo went further than the San Siro in that its infrastructure was left completely exposed. The nineteen 200-metre long helical ramps that enveloped the San Siro presented a solid geometry; the 56 vertical concrete ribs that supported the upper tier of the San Paolo did not. In between these ribs, at semi-regular intervals, were perpendicular stairwells working their way upward along the underside of the bowl. In common with the San Siro, plenty of empty space surrounded it providing enough distance from which to appreciate the shape and scale of the building.
Pier
Luigi Nervi (responsible for the Stadio Flaminio in Rome and Stadio Comunale in Florence, and a dab hand when it came to reinforcing concrete) was said to be impressed with Cocchia’s work. It is not known whether he was similarly appreciative of Armando Ronca’s.
1950s
Napoli didn’t perform as well in their new environment as might have been expected, succumbing to relegation within two years of moving in. That said, the club won promotion back into Serie A at the first attempt, winning the Coppa Italia – their first major trophy – in the process. It would be another 14 years before Napoli won another, although they were consistent enough in the league, generally finishing in the upper half of the table.
In the meantime, the San Paolo was proving its worth. As well as playing host to the Italian national team, it was used for football in the 1960 Olympic Games, was the main venue for the 1963 Mediterranean Games, was selected for the 1968 European Championship (one of three grounds chosen), the 1980 European Championship (one of four) and the 1990 World Cup (one of twelve).
It was in preparing for the 1990 World Cup that the San Paolo’s troubles started, a project to be supervised by Fabrizio Cocchia, son of the original architect. Certain improvements were straightforward enough. The lower tier was reconfigured to allow for a steeper rake. The lack of facilities, and space for them, was dealt with by erecting a raised concourse around the base of the stadium. New dressing rooms were constructed beneath the running track, as well as an underground multi-storey car park with room enough for 2,000 vehicles. Red seats were installed throughout, reducing the overall capacity. The upper tier was to be extended upwards to offset this reduction, and was, but not until after the World Cup.
And then there was the roof. Not the roof we see today but the one that the architect Giuseppe Squillante had envisaged. The issue was steel and a tender involving 8.5 million kilos of the stuff. Squillante’s more elegant design only required 2 million, and so was vetoed. The covering built in its place (engineered by Luigi Corradi) wasn’t unpleasant to look at but the twenty-eight L-shaped steel masts needed to support it were. The roof itself was made up of what the manufacturer, Caoduro, called ‘thermoformed radial tunnels’ – translucent polycarbonate panels, semi-circular along the length of the overhanging beams, like inverted gutters, and triangular in between, creating a sort of concertina effect. A sizeable gap was left between the perimeter of the upper tier and the underside of the roof, letting in light, ventilating the interior, and giving the impression that the canopy was somehow floating in mid-air.
From within it didn't look at all bad. From without it was a different story. Surrounded by steel pylons, the impact of the concrete bowl was lost. The extension to the upper tier, once finished, added yet more steel and detracted from the stadium's pre-existing rim, one of its most pleasing features. The effect was of something incomplete.
The 2019 Summer Universiade (University Games) provided an incentive to address some of the stadium's shortcomings, but not many. This 'restyling project' involved replacing the faded red seats with a pleasing mix of blue, grey, white and yellow ones, refitting the athletics track, installing two large digital screens, and refurbishing the changing facilities and the sound and lighting systems.
What it didn't address was the stadium's exterior, which needed, and still needs, a lot of work. The underside of the concrete bowl is spalled and the area that surrounds it is a mess. It is accepted that the best thing to do would be to dismantle the tier extension – and even the roof – but it appears that there's not enough money to be made in salvaging all that steel. Other issues include poor sight-lines, the rarely used athletics track, the perpetually empty car-park, and a reduced capacity of 54,732, which is decent enough by most club's standards but insufficient by Napoli's. The club's president, Aurelio De Laurentiis, has mooted the possibility of building a new ground somewhere else, free from the municipality's intransigency and lack of investment, but you can't see it happening anytime soon.
Yet the Stadio Diego Armando Maradona, as it has been known since 2019, is the scene of the some of the greatest moments in Napoli's history. Moreover, it generates an atmosphere and has a unique charm that can be hard to find in more modern constructions. It will gladly do for the time being.
