February 14 – FIFA and local officials have dismissed reports that contingency plans are being made to move World Cup matches away from Curitiba if authorities there fail to meet a February 18 deadline for completing the stadium.
The report appeared in one of Brazil’s biggest-selling newspapers, Folha de S.Paulo, but was quickly denied even though the stadium has huge logistical problems.
“No, no, no, this comes from a declaration made by (head of the Local Organising Committee) Ricardo Trade when he was asked by a newspaper in Brasilia if the alternative to Curitiba’s Arena da Baixada would be Gremio’s ground (in Porto Alegre),” Reginaldo Cordeiro, Curitiba’s World Cup secretary, told Reuters.
“Trade replied saying if there was to be an alternative the games would go elsewhere, but not Gremio,” Cordeiro added. “It’s rubbish. Curitiba has not been counted out.”
Cordeiro revealed, however, that FIFA’s stadiums manager Charles Botta planned to return next week to finally rule on whether Curitiba will be included in the competition.
The stadium is way behind schedule but FIFA executive committee member Jim Boyce, a member of the World Cup organising committee, also said the report was short of the mark.
“I have had no correspondence at all regarding plans for a change of the venue from Curitiba, but this issue and everything else will be on the agenda when the World Cup Organising Committee meets in Zurich on March 18 and any decision will be discussed by the executive committee on March 20 and 21,” he said.
Four matches are scheduled to take place at the 41,500-capacity stadium: Iran v Nigeria on June 16, Honduras v Ecuador on June 20, Australia v world champions Spain on June 23 and Algeria v Russia on June 26.
The original cost of Curitiba was set at 131 million reais but has since more than doubled. The delay is the worst of all the five unfinished stadiums due to be used for the World Cup, the first to take place in South America since 1978 and the first in Brazil for over half a century.
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