Building of Dneprohes - the biggest hydro-electric power station in Europe - began in the twenties of the last century in Zaporizhzhya. Youth, having taken part in building, equipped a small sport ground on one of the vacant lots on the left bank of the Dnipro. "Metalurg" stadium is situated there now.
The sport ground of “Dneprostroy” didn't have any stands, back rooms and fences. There was only a mediocre football field and a couple of track sectors.
At the beginning of the thirties the builders of "Dneprokombinat" (later Zaporizhstal singled out from it), and the students of Dneprovsky industrial institute, the students of technical schools and different specialized schools and courses created their own football team. Of course, this team couldn't compete with the best teams of the city. Nevertheless young football-players took active part in the competitions of the city. They didn’t lack for success!

At the place of this ground in 1931 «… on funds for accomplishment of the city New Zaporozhye the construction of stadium was started– sport camp» wrote magazine « Fizkulturnik Ukrainy» (Athlete of Ukraine).
In a year the "Proletar of Dniprobud" newspaper wrote: "On the Antipov sports ground (the first chairman of All-Union Board of Sports Groups of Ukraine) you can always play football".
On this ground, transferred to "Zaporizhstal" factory and named "Stal", football tournaments were held, and on the 30th of September, 1932 took place the grand opening of the Sports and Athletics Meeting of builders of Dneprostroy, devoted to the start-up of Dneprovskaya hydroelectric power station. Here were held the final games of the championship of republic in football, and in August, 1933 took place the first real sports holiday in our city - the All-Union Sports and Athletics Meeting of Builders.
In 1933 after small reconstruction the "Dneprostroy" ground was changed into "Stal" stadium. Still, only after the second reconstruction, carried out five years later, a modern comfortable stadium for 8 thousand visitors appeared in the city.

Opening of the new Antipov stadium "Stal" of the "Zaporizhstal" plant took place on May 2, 1938. This day the first football match was held at its field. The teams "Locomotive" (Zaporizhzhya) and "Stalinets" (Moscow) played there. A friendly match went off in a stubborn struggle. More experienced visitors won with the score 4-5.
The new stadium became the main sports scene of Zaporizhzhya and the centre of sports work of the metallurgical enterprises of the city. A good football field, race-tracks, and sectors for competitions of athletes were equipped there; checkrooms and showers for sportsmen, stands for the audience were built.
For their longstanding history the stands of the stadium, bearing today a sonorous name - "Metalurg", were visited by hundreds of thousands of Zaporizhzhya people, who were the witnesses both the fascinating football duels of the best clubs of the country, and the competitions of athletes, in which the best native and foreign sportsmen took part. Zaporizhzhya people honoured the champions and holders of the Cup of Ukraine - football teams: "Locomotive" and "Metalurg", Olympic champions - Leonid Zhabotinsky, Alexander Rezanov, Sergey Kushniryuk, Yuriy Lagutin, Tatyana Samolenko, the champion and the world record-holder Vladimir Yashchenko. The masters of Zaporizhzhya football began their sports way to this stadium - Pryadko, Rykun, Khmirov, Mozolevsky, and after the Great Patriotic War - Tishchenko, Ponomaryov, Zozulya, Malkin, Nepechyy, Oleynik, Pavlov, Grishin, Kashtanov, the honoured masters of sports Serebryannikov, Matvienko and others.
In 1973 the Western stand was put into operation and the capacity of the stadium was enlarged to the 27 thousand of visitors. Still, even such number of places didn’t give a chance to seat all the comers to watch the matches of the championship of the USSR of 1991, when "Metalurg" Zaporizhzhya played in the top league.

In 1980 the condition of the stadium was recognized as emergency. Fortunately, this accident rate of the Western stand was gradually eliminated by the efforts of "Zaporizhstal" industrial complex and access for the participants of competitions to the checkrooms was opened.
Still, in 2001 Football Federation of Ukraine forbade Zaporizhzhya to carry out matches at the Central stadium "Metalurg". The host team played their last match with “Shakhter” Donetsk at “Metalurg” stadium on the 31st of October. They started a spring part of the 11th championship of Ukraine at “Torpedo” stadium in Zaporizhzhya, but still that was not a native one.
That spring ex-mayor of Zaporizhzhya Olexadr Polyak took the decisive steps to improve this situation. He decided to reconstruct the stadium as soon as possible. However, this repair and later building itself was delayed for four years.
Due to new mayor’s (Yevgen Kartashov) persistence and irrepressible energy and also builders’ heroic efforts a new stadium for 12 thousand of visitors began to work on the 29th July, 2006 when the first match (“Metalurg” Zaporizhzhya – “Dynamo” Kyiv) of the first tour of the 16th championship of Ukraine took place.
By the way, the tickets for that match will be valid in 5 years in 2011.

  
  Name of the stadium - “Slavutich-Arena”.
Total number of seats – 11883.
Number of seats under the shed –(The eastern stand and the western stand) – 6825.
Number of seats in the open air – 5058.
Guest stand – 650 seats (Southern stand)
VIP box (100 seats) (The western stand).
Light intensity – 1400 luxes
Two checkrooms for the host team and guests 140 sq.m.
Additionally to the total number of seats:
-VIP box (100 seats)
-Press box– 60 and 6 commentary rooms (The western stand).
Seats for the disabled – 60 (The eastern stand).
The score board – 6x10m.


The fotos are from site of Metalurh fans www.fcmetallurg.zp.ua