Sunday, October 2, 2022 at 6:55 PM• Jonathan van Haaster • Last update: 18:57

Stadium De Kuip is in need of a major overhaul, but the necessary money is not available for this. That reports RTV Rijnmond. At the end of April it was definitively announced that the plug was pulled from Feyenoord City and that the Rotterdammers are focusing on a longer stay in De Kuip. For the maintenance, which has to be paid by Stadion Feijenoord, a nice amount of money is needed and that is not available at the moment.

Several facilities in the stadium are not yet of the desired level. For example, there is a lot of criticism about the condition of the toilets and there are also complaints about the small number of catering facilities. The stadium entrance gates are also in need of maintenance. Pure maintenance in the stadium should cost between ten and fifteen million euros. A large-scale renovation is currently unfeasible and therefore out of the question. Feyenoord is renting the stadium from Stadion Feijenoord, which means that the costs of maintenance are borne by the stadium and not the football club. Because the stadium is responsible for maintenance, the process takes a long time.

View the item with Sven van Beek here.

Where Feyenoord does have the money, the financial possibilities for Stadium Feijenoord are a lot less. With a maximum investment scope of one and a half million euros for this current season, only a few things can be maintained. “After the refinancing, hopefully there will be more financial scope to make additional investments,” says stadium director Jan van Merwijk. With the refinancing, he refers to the work being done on the bridge loan of 17.5 million euros that Stadion Feijenoord has concluded with Goldman Sachs.

In addition to the limited financial possibilities, what also plays a role in the difficult process is the fact that there are simply few people available. Van Merwijk will fulfill his role until the end of 2022, while right-hand man Carl Berg has been sick at home for some time. Nevertheless, a start has been made on a few things, Van Merwijk recently reported to the magazine Perspective. For example, the stadium has made the switch to a cashless payment system and it is no longer possible to pay with coins in the catering. “We also started tackling the sewage system and upgrading a number of toilets,” said Van Merwijk. He also reported that the video camera system had been upgraded and that maintenance was carried out on the fire alarm system.