Stadiums gone and missed: Braga’s 1º de Maio | OneFootball

(Photo: restosdecoleccao.blogspot.com)

It is funny how Braga hosts one of the most lauded football grounds built in Europe over the past two decades, but still, many feel a sense of lost nostalgia about the old 1º de Maio (in its full written form the Estádio 1º de Maio stadium meaning the 1st of May Stadium). Architecturally brilliant as it may be, the new ground built on the site of a former quarry may have presided over Sporting Braga’s golden age, but the lack of atmosphere, the lack of stands behind the goals and the bitter cold that often shivers down the spine for evening kick-offs make the stadium pretty to the eye but not as comfortable as one might think.

Not that the 1º de Maio was anything different, but there’s something in the old cement bowl structure that throws back memories that come wrapped in sweeter tones. The 1º de Maio may be missed, but it is not completely gone. The possibility has been mooted of a move back someday to a revamped version of a ground that hosted some of the most memorable nights in the football history of the ‘city of the Archbishops’.

A football city

Braga was one of the first cities in Portugal that embraced football unreservedly. Small local sides played wherever a dirt pitch was available in the first years of the game in town, especially around the Peões and Raio streets, but they soon moved to the Mitra ground, a place in a large estate where Sporting Clube de Braga was finally created back in 1921, and then As Goladas.

For the first decades the greatest sporting event in town was the clash with their rivals from nearby Guimarães but as the city started to grow, so did the number of supporters who flocked to see a side that had just dropped their green-and-white Sporting-inspired kit for an Arsenal lookalike shirt, after their Hungarian manager Josef Szabo visited London and brought back some kits with him. It was beginning for the club making a name for themselves.

Catholic, military and political hub

Braga, of course, was also an important social and political centre in Portuguese society. The home of the nation’s most lauded archbishop since the Middle Ages, a time when it rivalled Santiago Compostela for the western primacy of the Catholic church in the Iberian Peninsula, the city had always been closely linked to the church and the military, who had an important camp there, mainly to be close to the not-so-distant Galician border. It was from Braga that the military coup of 1926 was staged, with an army led by Marshal Gomes da Costa marching towards Porto, first, and then Lisbon, to take hold of power. Six years later, when António Salazar, by then head of the Treasury cabinet, was appointed Prime M, the coup made way for the Estado Novo era that would last until 1974.

(Photo: restosdecoleccao.blogspot.com)

Salazar was always fond of Braga, owing to his Catholic ethos and because his regime had kickstarted there, so it was no surprise that when his infrastructures minister Duarte Pacheco proposed a set of construction works that would revamp the impoverished nation’s economy, and football grounds were at the centre of it, Braga was selected as the first city to host a new modern ground, way ahead of Porto and Lisbon.

Stadium inauguration serves as propaganda for Salazar

Braga had only debuted in the top tier of Portuguese football in the late 1940s, as the club experienced severe economic issues that took them to the brink of bankruptcy. By the end of the decade, they had become a yo-yo club, but that would change in the following decades as Braga became one of the most established sporting forces in the land. The team were playing at the modest Campo da Ponte when news came that the city hall, alongside the national government, was bankrolling a new ground that would be located in the Parque da Ponte as part of an urban redevelopment of the area that would include other sporting facilities and public gardens as well.

The works began in 1946 and lasted for the following two years, and the architect responsible, Travassos Valdez, decided to take inspiration from the Jamor stadium that was about to be unveiled in Lisbon. To grant symbolism to the occasion, the first stone was laid on 26 May during the celebrations marking two decades since the military coup, and it was immediately decided that the stadium would be christened with this date as its name in honour of what the regime described as “glorious” day. Years later, on the exact same date, after some delays that postponed its opening for an entire year, the ground was finally inaugurated.

Braga, Porto, Sporting and Benfica at the opening party

Salazar, escorted by António Carmona, the President of the Republic and one of the military officers involved in the 1926 coup, presided over the ceremony in a fully packed ground. The stadium had a capacity for around 30,000 spectators, and the regime took special interest in making it an event where representatives of the whole of Minho region could be heard and seen in their support of Salazar. Portugal had remained unscathed by World War II, and the country, despite the political isolation due to its fascist ideals, was starting to be seen by some in the West as a necessary evil to fight the communist threat sponsored by the Soviet Union.

After a military and sporting parade, the ground hosted a friendly event with Sporting Braga drawing against FC Porto, and then Sporting and Benfica, who had been invited to represent the capital, playing for the amusement of the crowds in a match won by the Eagles, a well-supported club in the region despite Sporting’s early ascendance over Braga’s founders.

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Stadium boosts Braga’s standing in Portuguese football

From 1950 up to 2003, the 26 de Maio would become Braga’s ground in a period when the club became a regular top-half side. The stadium’s Olympic structure, a huge concrete bowl with a tarmac track around the pitch, didn’t allow for the creation of much of an atmosphere during tight matches, particularly in comparison with their bitter rivals Vitória SC, who enjoyed more fervent support in their grounds of the time – the Amorosa and then the Afonso Henriques – but still it quickly became a highly recognisable stadium in the Portuguese football landscape. It preceded the Antas (FC Porto), the Estádio da Luz (Benfica) and the Estádio José Alvalade (Sporting) as one of the most modern and best-equipped stadiums in the country.

Nevertheless, the lack of a stand behind one of the goals, where a huge Olympic tower was built, and the fact none of the stands around the pitch were covered made it cold and uncomfortable during wintertime, particularly in a region known for constant rainy days from Autumn to Spring. Still, it was home for the Bracarenses and they treated it as such. In 1974, when the Carnation Revolution toppled the fascist regime from power, the local authorities were quick to rename the ground from the old 26 de Maio to 1º de Maio in celebration of Workers’ Day.

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Portugal come to town

It remains the stadium’s name today, and during the following decades it grew in relevance in a country that was slowly starting to decentralise its football identity. In 1986, for the first time, the Portuguese national side played a match in Braga when the Seleção hosted East Germany, and were soundly beaten, 3-1. Over the following years, Portugal played another five times in the city, even if most of them were friendlies. On 6 June 2003, the national side drew against Paraguay in what was the final match for the Seleção at the ground.

By then, the construction work on the exciting new municipal stadium in Braga, commonly known as A Pedreira (The Quarry), was already underway. Braga as a host city was a cornerstone in the Euro 2004 project, particularly due to the revolutionary architecture that made it one of the most vanguard grounds in Europe at the time. The club knew that they would soon be moving to a new home, renting it from the city hall for the following decades, and the 2003/04 campaign became the last campaign Sporting Braga played at the 1º de Maio.

Minho derby provides fitting curtain call

The team, coached by Jesualdo Ferreira, finished a respectable fifth in the league standings and booked a place in the following UEFA Cup campaign. By 21 December, the side was ready to host the final match at the 1º de Maio, and it could be none other than a Minho derby against rivals Vitória, coached by Jorge Jesus.

The stadium was fully packed to say their goodbyes and the old ground was rewarded with a brilliant win. Frederik Sodestrom, a former Vitória man himself, opened the score right after the start, and Wendel netted a second from the spot before half-time. Marco Couto got a consolation goal for the visitors in the dying seconds, but it was a night for Braga fans to remember fondly for the rest of their lives.

A return in the offing?

Since that December night, the stadium has continued to be used not only by Braga’s youth setups but also by several nearby smaller clubs as well as to host other sporting events, even if the facilities have been suffering from a slow abandonment as the years went by. Many feared for its future, but news has sporadically surfaced over the past few years that Sporting Braga is considering a return home to a revamped 1º de Maio, probably helped by the economic bankrolling of their new Qatari partners, who helped fund their state-of-the-art training ground and academy facilities.

Braga have continued to use their former home, mainly to stage the club’s youth team matches

The stadium would be fully covered, bar the top end where the old tower would still stand alongside the exterior façade to preserve the historical appeal of the stadium. The capacity would be reduced to 25,000, as the club believes it’s more than enough to host their home supporters and, by removing the tarmac running track, it would help create a more intimidating atmosphere on match days. The ground would be surrounded by a hotel, a commercial area and a multisport pavilion.

Most importantly, the club would own the ground instead of renting it, as happened both with the 1º de Maio and the Pedreira, and the city would enjoy a new commercial, business and sporting hub. Since the inception of the project was first publicised, years have gone by without any practical work done, but many expect Sporting Clube de Braga to be back to their former home sometime in the future.

Dream of overcoming the Big Three

Should it come to pass, perhaps it will be time to start dreaming bigger as fans yearn to become only the sixth different club to win the Portuguese league title, and the first outside the nation’s two main metropolises of Lisbon and Porto. Such a notion is not farfetched nowadays; something nobody ever dreamt of when the first brick was laid on the ground of a stadium that would change name but would keep the same identity, that represents both the past and perhaps today’s strongest contender to be called Portugal’s Fourth Grande.