Atlético Madrid sports City project progress

Article posted by Coliseum, July 15^th, 2022

Image: Atletico Madrid, sportsfinding.com & palco23.com

The Mayor of Madrid (Spain) José Luis Martínez-Almeida announced recently that the City Council will give the green light to a new sports City project surrounding the Wanda Metropolitano, home of the LaLiga football club Atlético de Madrid.

The Council did not disclose financial details of the project, but it is reported that Atlético will invest more than €200m (£172m/$205m). It is hoped that work on the project, which would be partially funded by the LaLiga Impulso venture, can begin by the end of the year.

‘Palco23’ stated that the Madrid City Council has granted Atlético five plots of land near the Metropolitan Stadium in the Olympic Ring area. Three of them will be used for a sports city, which will include a stadium with a capacity to accommodate between 6,000 to 8,000 spectators. The other two plots will be used for the construction of soccer fields, paddle and tennis courts, and will be operated by the City Council, but their construction will be paid for by the Madrid club. Part of the works will be financed with the money contributed by the CVC fund to LaLiga Impulso.

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Club Atlético de Madrid, S.A.D., known simply as Atleti in the Spanish-speaking world and commonly referred to at the international level as Atlético Madrid, is a Spanish professional football club based in Madrid that plays in LaLiga. The club play their home games at the Metropolitano, which has a capacity of 68,456.

The 68,456-capacity Metropolitano Stadium is a stadium in Madrid, Spain. It has been the home stadium of Atlético Madrid since the 2017-2018 seasons. It is located in the Rosas neighborhood, in the San Blas-Canillejas district.

LaLiga and global investment fund CVC signed a strategic agreement on December 12^th last year setting in motion Boost LaLiga (‘LaLiga Impulso’), the project to boost the global growth of LaLiga and its clubs.

The Council believes it can develop an “authentic sports City” in the surrounding area utilizing infrastructure put in place for the Olympic bids, such as the half-built aquatics center which was mothballed in 2010 having already received a reported €100m (£89.8m/$110.1m) capital injection.

The Council said the new development could be utilized by the local residents and serve as a base to boost grassroots sport, as well as host major events.

The reform will also have an impact on improving mobility in the area in such a way that two exit accesses will be opened to the M-40 motorway and an addition to the service road, which will also be paid for by Atlético. The club also plans to incorporate a business plan to develop the area, with the opening of shops, restaurants and a hotel.

Recently, the club chaired by its President Enrique Cerezo reached an agreement with the real estate agency Civitas Pacencis to sell the Metropolitano’s name for 50 million euros over the next five years. Civitas will replace Wanda, whose contract for the naming of the Metropolitano with Atlético ended on June 30^th. For the agreement, which was extended from 2017 to 2022, Wanda paid fifty million euros.

‘Palco23’ further stated that currently, the main shareholder of Atlético de Madrid is Miguel Ángel Gil Marín, with 46.7 percent of the club’s shares (2.98 percent directly and 43.7 percent through the company Holding de Inversiones Atléticas). Another 32 percent corresponds to Quantum Pacific, an investment company owned by Israeli tycoon Idan Ofer.

The Madrid team closed the 2021 financial year with losses of 111.6 million euros, a figure that contrasts with the deficit of just 1.7 million in 2020. In the last year, the club had revenues of 339.3 million, a 1.6 percent less than in the previous season and, in addition, in the last financial year, the entity carried out a capital increase of 120 million.

Total transformation

‘sportsfinding’ stated that Atlético faces the final stretch to achieve another of the infrastructures that will round off an ambitious transformation phase.

The achievement of a great sports City and top-level facilities on the land attached to the Wanda Metropolitano is the immediate project that occupies Atlético and which is now going through a decisive phase. The idea of giving shape to the West Sector Olympic Park plan is also a commitment by the City of Madrid to finally find a way out of the failed Olympic project and recover the spaces that were allocated to that initiative, with a solution for the Aquatic Center as another major issue to resolve.

At this time, the file is in the phase of requesting reports from all areas of the local Government to have a general idea from the technical and legal point of view before being able to take it to the plenary session. Valuation is in progress. The process could already take a short time.

‘sportsfinding’ further stated that the engineering work plans to modify 1.2 million square meters of land to build one of the largest sports centers in Europe, a mixed-use infrastructure, for the use of Atlético and the residents of Madrid. The club will receive a long concession, for a minimum of 70 years, of some land on which it will build its sports City, where the first team will move in the future. At this time, the transformation of a first lot of land is being studied, inside it is planned from the construction of a small stadium if possible, a residence, offices, passing through soccer fields, tracks for different sports and even, for the second intervention, an enclosure with a great wave for the practice of surfing. In addition, a new improvement of the accesses must be undertaken.

There are several designs that are currently in the adjustment phase in order to specify, once the technical reports have been studied, that they will be able to accurately house the stadium annexes in this first part of the intervention. The Aquatic Center will not enter it first, as it will be part of a second batch still with an action to study, but with the commitment that it will also have a use within the environment. Atlético will use an important part of the economic boost from the agreement with CVC to continue growing in terms of infrastructure.

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