Estádio Serra Dourada

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The Estádio Serra Dourada is a football stadium inaugurated on March 9, 1975 in Goiânia, Goiás, Brazil, with a maximum capacity of 54,048 people. It was designed by the Pritzker Prize-winner Brazilian architect Paulo Mendes da Rocha. The stadium is owned by the Goiás state Government, and is the home ground of Goiás Esporte Clube and Vila Nova Futebol Clube.

[edit] History

Serra Dourada was completed in 1975 and was inaugurated on March 9 of that same year. It was one of the venues of the 1989 Copa América. The stadium was also the neutral ground used by CONMEBOL in the 1981 Copa Libertadores group stage replay match between Flamengo and Atlético Mineiro, in which Flamengo was declared the winner by CONMEBOL, after five Atlético Mineiro players were sent off by the referee José Roberto Wright.

The inaugural match was played on March 9, 1975, when Goiás State All-Stars beat the Portugal national team 2-1. The first goal of the stadium was scored by Portugal's Octávio. The stadium's attendance record currently stands at 79,610, set in the inauguration match.

The inauguration of Serra Dourada opened the way for Goiás Esporte Clube supremacy in the Goiás State Championship. From 1975 onwards (the so-called "Serra Dourada Era") the club won the State Championship seventeen times, while Goiânia, once the biggest team in the state, would never win the championship again.