Cape Verde National Stadium Closed For Repair

The Cabo Verde (Cape Verde) National Stadium, in Monte Vaca on the outskirts of São Filipe, in the city of Praia, will be closed from all football activities for one week to allow repairs to be made ahead of the 2021 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) qualifiers against Rwanda.

In the seven days that will also affect three league matches, the stadium management will implement a pitch mending process that will prepare it for the crucial qualifier.

The stadium turf was laid six years ago by Playground Internacional, who noted that the pitch drainage system was in bad shape and advised months ago for its maintenance.

“We have decided to rest it for one week,” Orlandinho Mascarenhas, manager of Cape Verde National Stadium told reporters.

[perfectpullquote align=”full” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””] “What is going to happen in that period is the stadium will still be open for business however the central pitch is going to be out of bounds.   [/perfectpullquote]

“And this is going to apply across all stakeholders who would otherwise be interested in using the pitch. We are going to write to the football clubs using it as their home ground to cooperate with us,” Mascarenhas added.

The 15,000 seater stadium, built in 2007 by the Chinese Government, covers an area of around 11,530 square metres and has FIFA-approved artificial turf and an athletics track.

Before its construction, it was a walk-in, walk out arena which offered greener pastures for animals to graze in and around the pitch.

In 2018, there was a plan to have the facility refurbished by the Chinese Government beginning on the 1st of September part of the plans being; to resurface running tracks at the main stadium and the adjacent warm-up area, and to put up a state-of-the-art media centre as well as pout up a new functional scoreboard and new floodlights.