So, I got myself into a bit of a rabbit hole the other day. I was thinking about Italia ’90, you know, the World Cup, and specifically about San Siro. There was all this talk flying around, some vague memory I had, about a “San Siro demolition Italia ’90 plan.” Did they really plan to knock the whole thing down back then? I just had to find out, or at least try to.
My first move, like anyone these days, was to hit the internet. I spent a good couple of hours just searching. Typed in every combination I could think of: “San Siro demolition plans 1990,” “Italia 90 stadium rebuilds,” “original San Siro third tier plans,” you name it. Got a lot of noise, mostly about the current debates on whether to demolish it now, which is a whole other can of worms, right?
After a while, I realized the internet wasn’t giving me the old, dusty details I was craving. So, I remembered my dad has this collection of old football magazines from that era. I mean, stacks of them. So, I went over to his place, and we started digging through his attic. Man, the dust! But it was kinda cool, flipping through those old pages, seeing the adverts, the old team photos.
We were looking for anything, articles, interviews, even little blurbs about the stadium preparations for Italia ’90. And we did find some stuff. Lots of talk about the new third tier, the iconic roof they were planning, the one with those big red girders. That was definitely the main event. But the “demolition” part? It was super vague.
It wasn’t like there was a clear, headline-grabbing plan saying “We’re tearing down San Siro and starting fresh for ’90!” Not that I could find, anyway. It seemed more like, in the early stages of planning for the World Cup upgrades, all sorts of ideas were probably thrown around. You know how these things go. Big committees, lots of important people wanting to leave their mark. I bet someone, somewhere, suggested a full demolition and rebuild as one option among many.
What became pretty clear from my little expedition into old paper and online archives was that the actual project, the one they went ahead with, was the massive renovation and expansion. Adding that third tier basically transformed the stadium. They did have to demolish parts of the existing structure to integrate the new bits, for sure. You can’t just plonk a massive new tier on top without some serious work. So maybe that’s where the “demolition plan” idea got twisted over time? People hear “demolition” and think the whole thing’s coming down.
The frustrating part was trying to pin down specifics. You’d think for such a massive project, for a World Cup, there’d be easily accessible, clear documentation outlining all the initial proposals, even the rejected ones. But no, it’s all bits and pieces, mentions in old articles, maybe some architectural journals I couldn’t get my hands on. It’s like trying to piece together a puzzle with half the pieces missing.
So, did I find a definitive “San Siro Demolition Italia ’90 Plan”? Not really, not in the sense of a fully fleshed-out, primary option to level the stadium. It feels more like “demolition” was part of the renovation process, or perhaps an extreme early idea that never got serious traction against the upgrade plan. The upgrade itself was already a monumental task.
This whole digging process, though, it was interesting. It just shows how history gets a bit fuzzy, and how big ideas for these huge events get talked about, changed, and then sometimes remembered differently. It makes you appreciate the San Siro we got for Italia ’90, flaws and all. It was a beast of a stadium back then, and honestly, still is, despite all the new talk. It was a fun little project for a few afternoons, anyway. Just a bloke, some old magazines, and a bit of curiosity.
