Parramatta Stadium Celebrates 25 Years

Sydney's Parramatta Stadium is celebrating its 25th anniversary.

25 years ago, on 5th March 1986, Parramatta Stadium was opened by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, followed by the first rugby league game being played at the stadium between Parramatta and St George on 16th March 1986.

The stadium is managed for the NSW State Government by the Parramatta Stadium Trust, within the Communities NSW department, and is self sustaining in regard to operational and minor works funding.

Parramatta Stadium was built by Civil and Civic on the site of Cumberland Oval with joint Federal and State funding, and since then remains the home ground for the Parramatta Eels.

The purpose built rectangular pitch caters for rugby league, rugby union and football.

As a result of opposition to the stadium development, the original 40,000 seat stadium became the 20,000 seat venue that exists today, and the Trust has recently approved a Master Plan, that on completion, will establish a 30,000 seat boutique stadium, complimenting the landscape of the Parramatta Park and the local precinct.

During the last quarter of a century, Parramatta Stadium has hosted a variety of sports from all the codes of football to baseball, hurling and boxing.

The last three years have included the Australasian Supercross Championships as a major spectacle to the stadium's event program.

As a multipurpose venue, concerts have been staged there, such as Michael Jackson in 1987 and Paul McCartney in 1993, as well as annual events like Youth Alive and Carols by Candlelight through the years.

In 2008 the venue was the gathering place for 15,000 Maronite Christians as part of the World Youth Day celebrations and other cultural events such as the Hindu Council's Deepavali Fair was held at the stadium in 2009/10. On 27th January this year, a charity event, Legends of Origin, was held at the stadium that raised $455,000 for the Queensland Flood Victims Appeal.

The 25th Anniversary of the opening of Parramatta Stadium will be marked by ceremony to be staged just prior to the start of the Parramatta Eels v Penrith Panthers game on Friday night, 18th March 2011 at 7pm.

Featured in the ceremony will be speeches from John Brown AO and Michael Cleary AO who were the Federal and State Sports Ministers responsible and instrumental in having the stadium built.

25 years on from the building of the stadium, six million people have passed through the gates, and the iconic venue has proven to be of enormous benefit to the community of Western Sydney, and the people of Sydney and NSW.