National Football & Rugby Stadium Works to be Completed by November, First Match Scheduled for March 2021

On Thursday 16 July 2020, Lydie Polfer, Mayor of the City of Luxembourg, and Dan Kersch, Minister of Sports, led a visit to the new football and rugby stadium which will be named "Stade de Luxembourg" (Luxembourg stadium).

Built on a site between the Cloche d'Or site and Kockelscheuer, the football and rugby stadium includes a play area with 9,385 covered seats for spectators, VIP areas, food kiosks, a businessclub with kitchen, rooms for the press, changing rooms and all its auxiliary functions. Most of these functional premises are housed in a three-storey building on the stadium grounds near Boulevard de Kockelscheuer. The stadium consists of diamond-shaped metal facade elements staged by lighting with various stages.

The stadium is built in accordance with the standards in force, especially the FIFA / UEFA standards (stadium category 4) and the World Rugby standards.

Currently 92.5% of the work has been ordered. Insulating facade works, ceiling works and finishing works are in progress.

The end of works is scheduled for the end of November 2020 (subject to a favourable development of the coronavirus pandemic). This will be followed by the commissioning of technical equipment, acceptance by the project manager, acceptance by the approved body as part of the commodo-incommodo authorisation, staff training and the operator to conclude with a reception by UEFA as part of a test match with spectators ahead of a first official match which is scheduled for March 2021.

Work on the facade began in April 2019, as did work on the hybrid lawn which has since been completed. Completion of the exterior landscaping work is scheduled for autumn 2020. This is being carried out in parallel with the finishing work on the building itself and the infrastructure work on the multifunctional plaza, currently in progress. 

Due to bad weather in winter 2017/18 and 2018/19 and taking into account various other contingencies, the schedule announced in April 2020 was already late on the initial completion date. Moreover, given the construction programme and consequently the specificity of the project, certain works could only be done under very precise weather conditions, such as waterproofing works and seeding of natural grass. Added to this was the pause in work from 20 March to 20 April 2020 following the declaration of a state of emergency by the government in the context of the coronavirus pandemic. The resumption of construction took place at a slower pace than before the state of emergency, although problems of supply and routing of material coming from all over Europe were already reported in February 2020; these problems still persist. Due to reduced human resources on the corporate side (family leave, illness, etc.), additional protective measures and problems with the supply of equipment, the coordination and phasing of the work of the various professional corps represents a new challenge.

Nevertheless, the City of Luxembourg and the state recently concluded an operating agreement; the operation will be carried out by the City of Luxembourg.

The estimated budget for the detailed final design project for the construction of the new football and rugby stadium amounts to €76,603,623.91, including tax. The project is subsidised by the Ministry of Sports (70%), capped at € 40,000,000. The estimated budget for the development of the multi-purpose car park amounts to €2,682,421.04, including VAT (100% funded by the City of Luxembourg).