Mustang Aréna

The Mustang Aréna was opened in 1986. The most visible change to the building came after renovation work finished in 2004, commissioned to prepare the venue for the IIHF World Championship. Those upgrades added the multimedia cube hanging above the centre ice and the modern lighting rig that floods the playing surface. The arena hosts the Ostrava Open tennis tournament, where the blue hard courts appear alongside the familiar blue seats used for hockey. The contrast is sharp: the tennis court is a temporary layer laid over the permanent infrastructure of a hockey rink.

The building’s exterior is a mix of dark cladding and angled white concrete, looking out over a large, empty car park that stretches towards the industrial skyline. Inside, the atmosphere is defined by the sound of skates on natural ice. The club HC Vítkovice Ridera plays its home games here, and the crowd can be a menace all night when the team is on a good run. The capacity is 9,833 for these matches, a number that swells for the concerts the arena is famous for hosting. Bands like Aerosmith and Iron Maiden have played here, their amplifiers dwarfed by the sheer scale of the steel trusses overhead.

The venue has hosted some of the biggest winter sport events in the world, including the IIHF World Junior Championships in 1994 and 2020. It has also seen the ice replaced for basketball and volleyball championships, proving its flexibility. The fans at the hockey games are used to this; they know the ground will change shape at the break if needed, and they sing for the team regardless of what is happening on the ice.