Pasadena Will Be Cup Site : Soccer: Rose Bowl is chosen to be one of nine venues for 1994 tournament.
After 16 months of mild suspense, Rose Bowl officials learned Monday what had been a foregone conclusion, that Pasadena will be one of nine sites for preliminary games in the 1994 World Cup soccer tournament.
The guessing game now involves whether the 70-year-old stadium will be selected for the final game, which could bring millions of dollars to the area.
In announcing the host cities at a news conference in New York City, officials with FIFA, soccer’s international governing body, broke with tradition and awarded a bid to the Silverdome in Pontiac, Mich. It will be the first time in World Cup history that games will be played in an indoor stadium. The decision to play at the Silverdome was made easier when a technique was perfected to grow grass indoors; Cup rules prohibit games on artificial turf.
The other sites: RFK Stadium in Washington, the Cotton Bowl in Dallas, Soldier Field in Chicago, Giants Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J.; Stanford Stadium in Palo Alto, the Citrus Bowl in Orlando, Fla., and Foxboro Stadium in Foxboro, Mass. Giants Stadium and the Cotton Bowl will be converted to natural turf.
World Cup chairman Alan Rothenberg said the 24-team tournament will be divided into six groups of four teams each. Two groups will be assigned to a three-city cluster, in an effort designed to play the maximum number of games in as many cities as possible.
Rothenberg said the groups will not be announced until July, along with the tournament schedule and the host city for the final. Rothenberg speculated, however, that Pasadena would be put in a cluster with Palo Alto and Dallas.
Monday’s announcement held few surprises, but one was the omission of Miami as a site. FIFA inspection teams had raved about Joe Robbie Stadium, built in 1987 as the home of the Miami Dolphins. The state-of-the-art facility with its spacious playing area was designed with soccer in mind and most closely resembles European soccer stadiums.
But since Miami began bidding for the World Cup, the city was awarded a major league baseball franchise, with the team to play in Joe Robbie. Since the World Cup games are played in July, there would have been a conflict. The stadium was available for three games, but not for the required four first-round games.
Miami was also considered an ideal venue because of its large Latino population and the city’s interest in the sport.
It is expected that Miami will nevertheless seek the final game, which casts a shadow over Pasadena’s chances.
“We’re not the favorite, in my opinion,” said David Simon, who is heading the Rose Bowl’s bid for the final. “We have heard, through the media, that FIFA loves Joe Robbie.”
Never in the World Cup, though, has a city that didn’t have preliminary games get the final.
World Cup tradition also holds that the final be held in the host nation’s capital city. But political complications make the picture in Washington murky.
If Redskin owner Jack Kent Cooke completes negotiations with the District of Columbia and builds a new stadium, that would be a likely choice for the final.
If the new stadium is not built, then RFK’s capacity of 56,500--the smallest of the nine sites--will probably be considered inadequate.
Simon could not estimate the additional income to the area should the final be held in Pasadena, but he guessed it would be similar to that generated by a Super Bowl, which the Rose Bowl will have in 1993.
The selection of the Silverdome was expected, and signals the international soccer community’s interest in experimenting with playing indoors on grass.
In announcing the Silverdome’s selection, FIFA General Secretary Sepp Blatter, who is Swiss, referred to the domed stadium as “a hole,” perhaps reflecting Europe’s unfamiliarity with this country’s huge indoor arenas.
Rothenberg said skeptics of playing indoors on grass have been won over by a new technology of growing grass indoors, at least for the three weeks of the World Cup. Rothenberg said it is hoped that the technology would eventually lead to grass that would last for several months.
If an indoor stadium is a departure for the conservative, tradition-bound FIFA, so too, is the apparent bending of the rules regarding field size. Both the Sliverdome and Giants Stadium have fields that are too narrow. (The Rose Bowl will have to take out seats to comply with the width requirements.)
Under World Cup rules, the field must be 75 yards wide by 150 yards long.
Blatter avoided directly answering questions about why two stadiums that had not met the size standards were selected. He suggested, however, that the stadiums would meet standards for international games, which call for fields 68 yards wide.
Another departure from World Cup tradition was the paring of venues from 12 to nine. The last two World Cups have had 12 host cities. FIFA has said it prefers the format because it affords greater exposure in the host country.
The decision, however, was a compromise. The World Cup organizing committee had wanted eight cities. Rothenberg said in an interview last week that the reduction of sites would save the organizers as much as $48 million.
WORLD CUP SITES
The nine sites selected for the 1994 World Cup soccer tournament:
CITY STADIUM CAPACITY BUILT Chicago Soldier Field 66,814 1922 Dallas Cotton Bowl 72,000 1930 East Rutherford, N.J. Giants Stadium 76,891 1976 Foxboro, Mass. Foxboro Stadium 61,000 1970 Orlando, Fla. Citrus Bowl 70,188 1976 Palo Alto Stanford Stadium 86,019 1922 Pasadena Rose Bowl 102,083 1922 Pontiac, Mich. Silverdome 72,794 1975 Washington RFK Stadium 56,500 1961
