Italian Serie A Femminile football club AS Roma has played its first match at a revamped Stadio Tre Fontane following upgrades carried out to bring the facility up to UEFA Women’s Champions League standards.
Roma, the reigning Serie A champion, has been forced to play European games away from its home ground as it failed to meet UEFA guidelines, but yesterday (Thursday) returned to defeat Ajax 3-0 in this season’s Champions League group stage.
Stadio Tre Fontane is also home to Roma’s men’s youth team and has been upgraded as part of a joint project between the club, Rome’s Department of Major Events, Sport, Tourism and Fashion and stadium operator ATI Tre Fontane.
The various upgrades carried out include the installation of a new lighting system, the division of the stands into sectors with the installation of 3,000 new seats for fans, and the creation of a media centre. With further improvements planned, Councillor for Major Events, Sport, Tourism and Fashion, Alessandro Onorato, said: “We managed to break a bureaucratic stalemate that had dragged on since 2018.
“We kept our word to the fans and together with AS Roma and ATI Tre Fontane, with great team work, we are ready to let people watch the girls of AS Roma at home for the first time in international competitions.
“After the reopening of the PalaTiziano, the adaptation of the Tre Fontane is another milestone achieved by our administration in terms of sports facilities, demonstrating the enormous commitment we are putting into the world of sport.”
President of ATI Tre Fontane, Ugo Pambianchi, added: “It has been a tiring and complex journey, but enormously rewarding. We completed the work in 35 days, reaching a goal that seemed impossible to us.
“With this phase we are at 60% of our project. A physiotherapy centre, a covered multi-purpose field and a new grandstand on the short side will now be built. We are increasingly projected towards the future: history tells of its places, its passions and its sport, but the future is built with skills, with ideas and with facts.”
The redevelopment of Stadio Tre Fontane comes with Roma due to present its final project in the coming weeks for its proposed new stadium in the Pietralata district, near the city’s Tiburtina railway station.
Roma this week launched a fan consultation effort, calling on supporters to offer their opinions on a project that intends to “create a vibrant environment that draws on tradition, passion and atmosphere of the Roma fans, but also offers an advantage to the home team, setting new standards at national level regarding the experience offered on match days”.
In August, the Municipal Government of Rome, Roma Capitale, maintained that the project to deliver a new stadium for Roma is “proceeding according to plan” amid legal action concerning ownership of the land on which the facility will be built.
