A football club is like a house of cards. A well-designed structure, with a solid base, which allows growth without hesitation and in which the highest card stands out: the team. No one expected such resounding success in the fight to win the League, but Girona's success is not the result of chance. The Catalan club, with the support of the City Football Group, has been strengthening its economic and sporting foundations for years. The next step, already designed, is to revalue its heritage by improving the infrastructures. The challenge is to build a legacy beyond whether the ball goes in or not, which consists of the new sports city in Vilablareix and the reform of the stadium.
"We are not unaware of the fact that Montilivi is very old and little investment has been made there. When we went down to Segona we said: 'We will live for a few years with the stadium we have'. We are back in Primera and now we are almost obliged to give this Girona a different stage", explains Ignasi Mas-Bagà, general manager of Girona, to this newspaper, at the III Club Days organized by LaLiga in Port Aventura.
The stadium, inaugurated in 1970 and the lowest capacity of Primera (14,700), has received improvements since 2018, the year in which the club agreed with the City Council on the concession until 2068 in exchange for an annual fee of around 200,000 euros and a progressive reform. The roadmap indicates that the first major change will come from 2028 with the reconstruction of the grandstand and the replacement of the roof. Then it will continue with the northern goal in 2029, preferably in 2030, and in 2032, the southern goal. The process will approach 34 million and will allow to increase the capacity. All the terms, however, will depend on the needs of the team, which has sold out several times this year. The feat of entering Europe, an increasingly real option, requires effort. "UEFA has visited the stadium. It is necessary to adapt some things to comply with the regulations, but it is feasible to do them in the summer. The performance of the team has made us consider accelerating investments in the stadium. We are working to see how we invest, in which sectors and levels", says Mas-Bagà.
Montilivi will be the jewel, but the team's day-to-day will also improve. Driven by money from CVC, which will provide 70% of the total of 25 million, the forecast is to finish the sports city in 2026. The 23-hectare site will have seven fields, four with artificial grass and three with hybrids. The club's headquarters will also be moved to the 16th-century Masana de la Massana, which will preside over the complex. The construction of the first phase, already approved by Urbanism, will begin in the coming weeks with the building permit and two fields will be built for the first team. Míchel's students will leave training at La Vinya, at the PGA golf course in Caldes de Malavella, in July. The second phase, still pending bureaucracy, will host the women's team, the lower categories, the Genuine league and the veterans. "The priority is the sports city. We want to start from the ground up, betting on talent. We want to leave a mark, that what is happening remains in time", concluded Mas-Bagà.
