Russian farmer builds straw football stadium to mock cost of World Cup venue
Russian farmer Roman Ponomarev has gone to elaborate lengths to build a straw stadium as a stunt to mock the excessive costs of Zenit St Petersburg stadium, which will host 2018 Football World Cup matches.
Recently opened ahead of the World Cup, the stadium had gone significantly over budget and had its designs changed several times.
But few critics have been as dedicated as Ponomarev who spent five days and used 4500 straw bales to build a replica that can seat up to 300 people.
He even built a sign entrance of the ground reading: “Not a single ruble was stolen during the construction of this stadium.”
His costs were only a fraction of the St Petersburg government’s- $US673 compared with the $US720 million it cost to build the real thing.
Roman Ponomarev’s straw stadium. Photo: Instagram
Ponomarev told the website Sport.ru: “At first they said that the St Petersburg stadium would cost 6 billion rubles, then 48 billion rubles; finally, it turned out that it hadn’t even been completed yet. Our straw stadium is intended to mock this debacle.”
Officials have reportedly responded lightheartedly, offering Ponomarev tickets to a home game for the Zenit St Petersburg football club.
The Financial Times reports that the stadium’s construction has been marked by corruption, and police this week arrested deputy governor Marat Oganesyan on charges of orchestrating a 50-million-ruble kickback scheme with the subcontractor building the scoreboard.
The stadium in St Petersburg. Photo: Andrew Shiva/Wikipedia, via Wikimedia Commons
“The roof leaks, has failed tests to assess if it can withstand strong winds from the Gulf of Finland and could collapse if snow accumulates and cannot be removed,” the article said.
After the death of the projects’s Japanese architect Kisho Kurokawa, designs were altered resulting in a six-year construction period and cost inflation estimated at 540 per cent.
A retractable roof was part of the original designs but this was found impossible to implement.
Last year, Reuters reported that the total cost of the 2018 World Cup is projected to be 620.9 billion rubles ($13.2 billion).
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