Concrete progress on Cagliari's new stadium has also been made in recent days, with the final green light for the project from the decision-making conference . Further developments are now expected by the end of the year, so that the demolition of the Sant'Elia stadium and the construction of the new stadium, which will be named after Gigi Riva, can begin as soon as possible. "We have complied with UEFA and FIGC recommendations, at significantly higher costs, in wanting to immediately build a 30,000-seat stadium, thus allowing the city of Cagliari to bid to host the 2032 European Championships," recalled Cagliari General Manager Stefano Melis, a guest today at the Social Football Summit in Turin. "Now we expect the government to finally make the stadium equity fund operational, supporting our project as the Municipality and the Region of Sardinia already do, and thus providing a concrete boost to the renewal of our country's crumbling stadium landscape. We remind you that this is a public project – with a fifty-year concession to whoever wins the international tender – and that it will be financed largely by private capital.
Cagliari has announced its intention to submit the Economic and Financial Plan (PEF) to the Municipality of Cagliari by the first half of December , "hoping to then have all the tools available to begin building an infrastructure designed to reshape Cagliari's sporting, economic, and social future, becoming both a point of reference for Sardinia and a flagship for Italy," Melis said. The PEF will be certified by UniCredit, while SFIRS (the Sardinia Region's financial institution) has confirmed its willingness to lead the debt collection process, along with the Istituto per il Credito Sportivo and other commercial banks.
The project for Cagliari's new stadium has been ongoing for over ten years and was a cornerstone of Tommaso Giulini's presidency, which took over the club from Massimo Cellino in June 2014. "Building a stadium in Italy is an act of faith. But we have never stopped ," Melis emphasized during the panel organized by Lega Calcio Serie A, dedicated to the topic "Are Football Infrastructures a Real Investment? Which Models Are Truly Sustainable?" and held together with representatives from Deloitte, Udinese, and Fiorentina.
"In Cagliari, we've been working on the new stadium project for almost a decade now, and if our club hadn't had a solid ownership structure with strong, deeply-rooted principles—persistence being undoubtedly paramount—I seriously doubt we would have continued ," continues the Cagliari general manager. "Over the years, millions have been spent on legal, financial, strategic, and design consultancy, but above all, it took a great deal of patience to accommodate the requests of the various political factions and the requirements of the numerous public bodies involved in the process."