Gamla Ullevi (, "Old Ullevi") was a

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

stadium A stadium (: stadiums or stadia) is a place or venue for (mostly) outdoor sports, concerts, or other events and consists of a field or stage completely or partially surrounded by a tiered structure designed to allow spectators to stand or sit ...

Gothenburg Gothenburg ( ; ) is the List of urban areas in Sweden by population, second-largest city in Sweden, after the capital Stockholm, and the fifth-largest in the Nordic countries. Situated by the Kattegat on the west coast of Sweden, it is the gub ...

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. It borders Norway to the west and north, and Finland to the east. At , Sweden is the largest Nordic count ...

. Named Ullevi until 1958 when Nya ("New") Ullevi opened, it was built in 1915–1916 and opened on 17 September 1916 with the game between IFK Göteborg- AB København (2–2). It had a capacity of 15,000 to 18,000, depending on usage. The record attendance is 32,357 and was set 2 May 1957, when Örgryte IS played

IF Elfsborg Idrottsföreningen Elfsborg, more commonly known as IF Elfsborg or simply Elfsborg (), is a professional association football, football club based in Borås, Sweden, and is affiliated to the Västergötlands Fotbollförbund. They play in the Alls ...

. IF Elfsborg won 2–1. Demolition of Gamla Ullevi began on 9 January 2007 at 11.15 AM local time. The stadium has been replaced with a new football stadium. The new stadium, opened on 5 April 2009, has been named Gamla Ullevi as well.

Name

Gamla Ullevi was named after the Nordic god Ull. He was a skier and archer who chased away the winter so he could wake up the goddess of the earth. The word ''vi'' means holy place. When Gamla Ullevi first opened it was called Ullervi, but after being pressured by a professor of Nordic languages, Hjalmar Lindroth, the ''r'' was removed. It was only added in the first place to make the name easier to pronounce. (Johansson & Nilsson 1992, p. 4)

History

Before Ullevi, the location was called ''Idrottsplatsen''. It was a

velocipede A velocipede () is a human-powered land vehicle with one or more wheels. The most common type of velocipede today is the bicycle. The term was probably first coined by Karl von Drais in French as ''vélocipède'' for the French translation ...

arena with room for 600 spectators. Eventually other sports began to use the facilities and a tenniscourt was built in 1901. Other courts were added too, but a new football stadium was needed with a proper grass pitch because of the growing interest in football. ''Göteborgs idrottsförbund'' created a corporation that had a capital of 90 000kr to spend on a new arena. The end cost of Gamla Ullevi was 160 000kr. It was designed as a stadium for only football despite half-promises being made to the archers and

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about space. At that time, the finished arena could hold 12 000 spectators. (Johansson & Nilsson 1992, p. 6–7) Ullevi became more than just an arena for football though. Next to the football pitch, the ice-skating rink was built and opened 6 January 1917 with a

bandy Bandy is a winter sport and ball sport played by two team sport, teams wearing Ice skates#Bandy skates, ice skates on a large ice surface (either indoors or outdoors) while using sticks to direct a ball into the opposing team's goal. The playin ...

match.

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and

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were two sports that also used the facilities, as well as

boxing Boxing is a combat sport and martial art. Taking place in a boxing ring, it involves two people – usually wearing protective equipment, such as boxing glove, protective gloves, hand wraps, and mouthguards – throwing Punch (combat), punch ...

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handball Handball (also known as team handball, European handball, Olympic handball or indoor handball) is a team sport in which two teams of seven players each (six outcourt players and a goalkeeper) pass a ball using their hands with the aim of thr ...

, and

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. (Johansson & Nilsson 1992) In 1924, Gothenburg city became the owners of Gamla Ullevi. They closed it in 1934 for renovations where they added more seats for spectators, and reopened in 1935. (Öhnander 2002, p. 10) The opening match was between Örgryte IS and AIK (3–1). (Johansson & Nilsson 1992, p. 48) After Nya Ullevi was opened, it became the home arena to the three football clubs (''GAIS'', ''IFK'' and ''ÖIS'') but they moved back to Gamla Ullevi in 1992. (Öhnander 2002, p. 7)

Gottepojkarna

Giovanni Galligani was the leader of Gottepojkarna, the snack and drink providers during the match. They sold chocolate, bananas, biscuits and ''Ullevikolan'' (the Ullevi toffee). There was a main kiosk where all the snacks could be bought, but during the match Gottepojkarna walked around with metal boxes with each type of snack in a separate compartment. These boys had been trained so that when a spectator ordered something they could throw the snack to the customer. The change was also thrown back up and they always hit the right target. (Johansson & Nilsson 1992, p. 20)

Ullevi-Bladet

''Ullevi-Bladet'' was the name of the match-program that could be bought. It cost 25 öre and was published by ''Idrottsjournalisternas Klubb'' (''The Sport Journalists Club'') but financed by advertisements. The magazine featured an introduction to the match, the line-up of both teams and the points-chart of

Allsvenskan Allsvenskan (; ), also known as Fotbollsallsvenskan (, ) is a professional association football league in Sweden and the highest level of the Swedish football league system. Founded in 1924, it operates on a system of promotion and relegatio ...

. (Öhnander 2002, p. 27)

Gallery

Image:IFK Göteborg–VfL Wolfsburg, Gamla Ullevi, 17 July 2005.jpg, The home stand (on the left) and the away stand (on the right). Image:Gamla Ullevi 20060828-2.jpg, The north stand, scoreboard and TV screen.

External links

Gamla Ullevi
– official site

References

Johansson, Bo & Nilsson, Bo Sigvard. ''Gamla Ullevi''. Tre Böcker Förlag AB, 1992. Öhnander, Bengt A. ''Från Ulleviss arenor''. Tre Böcker Förlag AB, 2002. {{coord, 57, 42, 21, N, 11, 58, 51, E, region:SE_type:landmark, display=title 1916 establishments in Sweden 2007 disestablishments in Sweden Football venues in Gothenburg IFK Göteborg Örgryte IS Defunct football venues in Sweden Sports venues completed in 1916 Sports venues demolished in 2007 1910s establishments in Gothenburg and Bohus County 21st-century disestablishments in Västra Götaland County