Ibrox Stadium

Ibrox Stadium, Glasgow
©2022 Gazetteer for Scotland

Ibrox Stadium, Glasgow

Ibrox Park is the home of Rangers Football Club, and is located on Edmiston Drive, about 3 miles (5 km) south southwest of Glasgow city centre. Today it has a capacity of 50,411 making it the third largest stadium in Scotland. Before seating, the record capacity was 118,567 for a League game against Celtic in 1939.

Established in 1873 by four friends who wished to play football and create their own team, Rangers has grown to become the most successful team in Scottish football. The first match that this team played was against Callander FC at Flesher's Haugh on Glasgow Green and, although the game ended in a draw, it was the start of nearly 130 years of football. By Season 1890-91 and the start of the Scottish League Championship, Rangers was now playing at Ibrox after brief spells playing at Burnbank and Kinning Park.

A founder member of the Scottish League, Rangers has won the Scottish League Championship 47 times (more than any other club), the Scottish Cup 27 times, the League Cup 20 times and the European Cup Winners Cup in 1972, when they beat Moscow Dynamo in the Nou Camp Stadium in Barcelona, Spain.

Rangers has won the League Championship 9 times in a row from 1988-89 to 1996-97, a feat equalled by Celtic in seasons 1966-67 to 1974-75.

The stadium has been the location of two major disasters; in 1902 a wooden stand collapsed with the loss of 25 lives and 517 injured while, in 1971, 66 people were killed and more than 200 injured in a crush as a crowd was leaving the stadium. Two people had been killed in a similar crush in 1961. The 1971 disaster was the catalyst for a redesign and rebuilding of the stadium, which reopened in 1981 at a cost of almost £10 million. The B-listed red-brick main stand, with wood-panelled hallway and boardroom, was substantially retained. The stadium was subsequently extended during the 1990s.

An unusual event took place in Ibrox Stadium in 1917 when King George V presented honours, including knighthoods and war medals, in an open-air public investiture. King George VI opened the 1938 Empire Exhibition with a speech at Ibrox, which has also hosted several significant concerts, involving artists such as Frank Sinatra and Rod Stewart. The stadium was used for the Rugby Sevens matches played during the XXth Commonwealth Games held in Glasgow in 2014.


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