Maracaña Stadium

Maracanã Stadium

Maracanã Stadium, Portuguese Estádio do Maracanã, formally Estádio Jornalista Mário Filho, association football stadium located in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, that was completed in 1950.

The first impression on visiting Maracanã Stadium—said to be named for the Maracanã River and sharing the name of its surrounding neighbourhood—is its size. It is among the largest football grounds in the world, though its capacity has been significantly reduced over the years as a result of multiple renovations. When it was built for the World Cup in 1950, it could hold somewhere around 200,000 standing spectators. The final of that year’s World Cup between Uruguay and Brazil officially attracted 173,830 fans, although some estimates put the actual attendance closer to 210,000—a record attendance at a World Cup match and one that is unlikely to be broken. Brazil lost the game in a shock defeat, and football-mad Brazilians still remember the upset as the Maracanaço (the Maracanã blow).

Maracanã Stadium—which was designed by two Brazilian architects, Raphaël Galvão and Pedro Paulo Bernardes Bastos—has also been used for exhibition matches for sports other than football. Pope John Paul II conducted Masses here. The stadium has also hosted Olympic Games and Paralympics Games ceremonies, and it is a regular concert venue. In 1991 it set a world record for the largest paying audience for a single band when 198,000 people came to see pop group A-ha.

The stadium’s raison d’être, however, remains football, and, appropriately, it is inextricably linked with one of Brazil’s and, indeed, the world’s greatest players, Pelé. It was here that he made his debut for the Brazilian national team against Argentina in 1957, scored the 1,000th goal of his career in 1969, and played his last game for Brazil in 1971.