Stade de Gerland

From 1950 to 2015 Olympique Lyonnais played here, but the club left for Parc Olympique Lyonnais in 2016 and Lyon OU took over in 2017. The name changed with it: Matmut Stadium de Gerland, under a ten-year deal worth €20 million. Before that it was simply Stade de Gerland, opened in 1926 after construction that began during the First World War. The capacity has never stayed still. It reached 51,860 for UEFA Euro 1984, when extra stands were added and the athletics track removed. The all-seater requirement for the 1998 FIFA World Cup pulled it back to 40,500. The current figure is 35,029. The highest attendance remains 48,552 for a Ligue 1 match against Saint-Étienne in 1982. The stadium hosted the 1998 World Cup quarter-final between Germany and Croatia, and the 2003 FIFA Confederations Cup semi-final where Marc-Vivien Foé died. It also held the 1986 European Cup Winners' Cup Final and the 1972 Rugby League World Cup Final. Architects Tony Garnier and René Gagès designed it, with the City of Lyon under Mayor Édouard Herriot.

Matmut Stadium de Gerland is a rugby ground now, but it carries the weight of decades as a football arena. The 2017 rebuild was not cosmetic — it was a complete identity shift, from football to rugby, natural grass to artificial turf, Olympique Lyonnais to Lyon OU. The only constant is the location: Gerland, in Lyon's 7th arrondissement. What makes this place different from any other stadium in France is that it held both a World Cup and a Rugby League World Cup Final, and that it still stands on land that was being worked on when the First World War ended.