Murrayfield Stadium (known as BT Murrayfield Stadium for sponsorship reasons, or popularly as Murrayfield) is a Rugby stadium located in the Murrayfield area of Edinburgh, Scotland. It has a seating capacity of 67,144 making it the largest stadium in Scotland and the fifth largest in the United Kingdom.
The stadium is the home of the Scottish Rugby Union (SRU) and is mainly used as a venue for rugby union. The stadium hosts most of Scotland's home test matches and the Scottish Hydro Electric Cup final, as well as URC and European Rugby Champions Cup matches.
Although primarily a rugby union stadium, Murrayfield has in the past hosted American football, rugby league and association football matches, as well as numerous music concerts.
Murrayfield is located next to Murrayfield Ice Rink, Murrayfield Curling Rink, and is close to Edinburgh Zoo. It is named after the area of Edinburgh it is located in, Murrayfield. There are two cricket pitches in the immediate vicinity at Roseburn Park used by Murrayfield DAFS CC (formed from mergers between several local teams) and also four rugby pitches owned by the SRU which were used by teams including the amateur club Murrayfield Wanderers RFC - they and their predecessors had played there since 1902 but were asked to vacate in 2018 as the governing body had plans to develop the land. Wanderers moved their training base to Roseburn but continued to hire the Murrayfield pitches for some matches.
History
The SRU identified 19 acres of land at Murrayfield, purchasing this from Edinburgh Polo Club at Murrayfield, having raised money through debentures. A stand and three embankments were constructed, which took two years. On 21 March 1925 were the first team to visit Murrayfield, with 70,000 people watching beat them to win their first Five Nations Championship Grand Slam.
During the Second World War the ground at Murrayfield was offered to the nation and was taken over by the Royal Army Service Corps and used as a supply depot. During the war years the armed forces sports authorities managed to arrange two Scotland v. England services internationals each year, on a home-and-away basis. Scotland's home matches were played at Inverleith for the first two years with a return to Murrayfield in 1944 after that ground's derequisition. 토토
Murrayfield's record attendance of 104,000 was set on 1 March 1975 when Scotland defeated 12–10 during the 1975 Five Nations Championship. This attendance stood as a world record until 1999.
The East stand was built in 1983.
In October 1991 another debenture scheme was launched, to finance a more comprehensive redevelopment of the West Stand. The new West Stand was designed with a 48-metre cantilever roof. The old West Stand housed a museum, but this was not replaced and plans for a new visitor centre were shelved when the game turned professional. The first phase was completed in January 1993 with the new north and south stands opening. In February 1994 the centre section of the new West Stand opened. In 1994, Murrayfield completed a £50-million renovation where floodlights were installed for the first time.
In October 2012, SRU chief executive Mark Dodsontold the BBC that it was actively seeking a name sponsor for Murrayfield:
The single biggest piece of our inventory is our national stadium. We would like to see if we can monetise that. It would be crazy for us not to look at using our single biggest piece of inventory to drive revenue. We want to get the right price for it.
In addition, Dodson indicated that the SRU was actively seeking a site for a completely new stadium with a capacity of 10,000 to 15,000 as a future home for Edinburgh Rugby. The pitch was damaged by nematodes in the lead up to the 2013 autumn internationals. This led the SRU to replace the grass with a Desso surface from the start of the 2014 season. A naming rights deal with BT was agreed in May 2014, resulting in the stadium being officially named as the BT Murrayfield Stadium.
