Abe Lenstra Stadion

Abe Lenstra Stadion

UEFA
Full name	Abe Lenstra Stadion
Location	Heerenveen, Netherlands
Owner	Sportstad Heerenveen
Capacity	27,224
Surface	Grass
Scoreboard	Yes
Construction
Built	1993
Opened	20 August 1994
Architect	Alynia Architecten Harlingen B.V.
Tenants
SC Heerenveen

Abe Lenstra Stadion (Dutch pronunciation: [ˌaːbə ˈlɛnstraː ˌstaːdijɔn]) is a football stadium, located in Heerenveen, Netherlands. It is currently used mostly as a home ground for Eredivisie club Heerenveen. The current capacity is 27,224.

Naming

The stadium is named after Abe Lenstra, generally considered to be the greatest Heerenveen player in the history of the club. Abe was born on 27 November 1920 in Heerenveen and joined the club aged 15 years. After almost 17 years at Heerenveen, he joined SC Enschede in 1954. He left this club in 1960 to join SC Enschede's archrival Enschedese Boys. In 1963 he stopped playing football at the age of 42. In total he scored 700 goals in about 730 matches. Abe died on 2 September 1985, he was 64 years old, at the eve of what was to become the only international match to be played in the community sportspark that was to become the (old) Abe Lenstrastadium.

Construction of the stadium

The construction of the stadium started in 1993. The plan was to build a stadium with open corners, but when the construction was well underway the club decided to close the gaps. At the time the building was finished, it had a maximum capacity of 14,500.

On 20 August 1994 the stadium was officially opened by Prince Willem-Alexander of the Dutch royal family. He made the symbolic first kick-off in this stadium. After the opening the first match started between SC Heerenveen and PSV Eindhoven. At the time Ronaldo played at PSV, this match was his first one in Europe.

Expansions

East entrance of the stadion

Because SC Heerenveen kept growing and the results were getting better every year, the club planned the first expansion of the stadium in 2002. The capacity of the stadium was almost doubled to 26,100 seats.

Throughout the years empty spots in the stadium were filled with seats. Together with some other changes in the stadium the number of seats increased to the current 26,800.

In 2011 there was a plan to have another expansion of the stadium, taking the capacity to 32,000. The construction should be ready for the start of the 2012/2013 Eredivisie season. The reason for the expansion is the ever growing waiting list for the club's season tickets.

Along with that, more people in the stadium means more income which leads to a bigger budget for the club to work with. However, this expansion was seen as too risky and financially unfeasible.

There were plans to expand the stadium to 29,000 seats over the course of the summer of 2012, however the economic downturn shelved these plans.

World Cup bid

The stadium was one of five stadiums in the Netherlands selected by the KNVB to host games as part of the combined Belgium–Netherlands 2018 FIFA World Cup bid. A successful bid would have meant that the stadium capacity would have been increased to the minimum required seating of 44,000 In December 2010 FIFA announced that the 2018 World Cup would be hosted by Russia. Just before the announcement of the World Cup the club announced that the next expansion would be postponed.

The other four selected host cities in the Netherlands were Amsterdam (Amsterdam Arena and Olympisch Stadion), Rotterdam (Feijenoord Stadion De Kuip and De Nieuwe Kuip), Eindhoven (Philips Stadion) and Enschede (De Grolsch Veste).

2024 UEFA Women's Nations League Finals

The stadium was one of three selected to host the 2024 UEFA Women's Nations League Finals matches. It will host 1 match.

Date	Team No. 1	Result	Team No. 2	Round
28 February 2024	Netherlands	0–2	Germany	3rd place

See also

• List of football stadiums in the Netherlands
• Lists of stadiums