Stadion Hristo Botev
Ten years passed between the reconstruction's first digger and its reopening whistle. Work began in 2013 to bring the ground up to UEFA standard ahead of the 2015 European Under-17 Championship, halted in the summer of 2014 when Corporate Commercial Bank, the project's main backer, collapsed, and did not resume until 2019–2020, this time funded from the central budget. Botev Plovdiv played the reopening match against Levski on 29 April 2023, nine years after the site had been left half-finished.
The ground occupies land that once held the playing field of St Augustine, a Catholic college founded in 1923; Plovdiv architect Anton Karavelov drew up the stadium that replaced it, opened on 14 May 1961 with a friendly against Steaua that Botev won 3:0.
The rebuilt stadium seats all 18,777 spectators, three in four of them under cover, with parking for 600 cars alongside. The pitch stays natural grass through winter thanks to an artificial-sun system. In 1966, a Levski fixture here drew 37,000 and ended in crowd disorder serious enough that the derby was moved to another ground for a period; in 2000 the stadium hosted the Bulgarian Cup final, won 2:0 by Levski over Neftohimik.
Who plays here
-
Botev Plovdiv
164 matches
-
Yantra 2019
135 matches
Recent matches here
| Date | Match | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 2 Sep | Yantra 2019 — Pirin Blagoevgrad | 2:0 |
| 30 Aug | Botev Plovdiv — Levski Sofia | 1:3 |
| 23 Aug | Yantra 2019 — Sportist Svoge | 1:0 |
| 11 Aug | Yantra 2019 — Montana | 3:2 |
| 10 Aug | Botev Plovdiv — Spartak Varna | 3:2 |
| 1 Aug | Botev Plovdiv — Cherno More Varna | 1:0 |
| 25 Jul | Yantra 2019 — Spartak Pleven | 0:2 |
| 21 Jul | Botev Plovdiv — Lokomotiv Sofia | 1:1 |