Coventry Building Society Arena

Wikipedia contributors · CC BY-SA · EN · 04/10/2026

The Coventry Building Society Arena (often shortened to the CBS Arena or just simply Coventry Arena, and formerly known as the Ricoh Arena) is a complex in Coventry, West Midlands, England. It includes a 32,609-seater stadium which is currently home to Premier League club Coventry City, along with facilities which include a 6,000 square metre (64,600 sq ft) exhibition hall, a hotel and a casino. The site is also home to Arena Park Shopping Centre, containing one of UK's largest Tesco Extra shopping centres. Built on the site of the Foleshill gasworks, it is named after its sponsor, Coventry Building Society who entered into a ten-year sponsorship deal in 2021. For the 2012 Summer Olympics and 2022 Commonwealth Games, where stadium naming sponsorship was forbidden, the stadium was respectively known as the City of Coventry Stadium and Coventry Stadium.

Originally built as a replacement for Coventry City's Highfield Road ground, the stadium was initially owned and operated by Arena Coventry Limited (ACL), with Coventry City as tenants. ACL was owned jointly by Coventry City Council and the Alan Edward Higgs Charity.

Following a protracted rent dispute between Coventry City and ACL, the football club left the arena in 2013; playing home matches in Northampton for over a year before returning in September 2014. Within two months, both shareholders in ACL were bought out by rugby union Premiership Rugby club Wasps, who relocated to the stadium from their previous ground, Adams Park in High Wycombe. A further dispute with Wasps prior to the 2019–20 season saw Coventry City leave the Ricoh for a further two seasons. In March 2021, Wasps and Coventry City agreed to a ten-year deal to return to the arena and the city of Coventry. The deal became null and void with Mike Ashley's Frasers Group's purchase of the arena. In April 2023, it was announced Coventry City and Frasers Group had agreed a five-year deal for Coventry City to play at the Arena, and on 23 August 2025, Coventry City announced they had become the landlords of the Arena following the completion of an acquisition deal from Frasers Group.

The stadium was the first cashless stadium in the United Kingdom, with customers using a prepay smartcard system in the ground's bars and shops. Following this, the stadium concourse and bars have remained cashless.

History

Planning a new stadium

The decision to move Coventry City from Highfield Road to a new stadium – with a larger capacity and better road links and parking facilities – was made in 1997 by the club's then-chairman Bryan Richardson. It was anticipated that the new stadium would be ready for the 2000–01 season. Permission for the construction of a 45,000-seater stadium was given in the spring of 1999, with a targeted completion date of August 2001. However, the stadium was delivered four years behind schedule, and was more basic than anticipated in the original plans.

Coventry were one out of three cities to bid for England's new national stadium along with London and Birmingham. In 2001, Nick Nolan, the leader of Coventry City Council, claimed that their proposal was always the strongest as the construction could be completed within three years. The council's plan was to build a 90,000 all-seater stadium for an estimated cost of £250 million. However, it was decided that Wembley, London would remain the location for the national stadium.

The original design for the arena was for a state-of-the-art stadium with a retractable roof and a pitch that could slide out to reveal a hard floor for concerts. After Coventry City's relegation from the Premiership in May 2001, a number of contractor/financier withdrawals, and England's bid to host the 2006 FIFA World Cup ending in failure, the plans were significantly downsized. By the summer of 2002 plans were set for a more basic 32,500-seat stadium.

Naming of the stadium

The arena's first name, 'The Ricoh Arena' came from a multi-year sponsorship deal, reported to be worth £10 million with camera and photocopier manufacturer Ricoh. During construction the stadium was variously referred to as the Jaguar Arena, Arena Coventry and Arena 2000.

The sponsorship deal with Ricoh came about after the stadium's initial sponsor, luxury car manufacturer Jaguar, was forced to pull out because of the commercial difficulties that had caused the controversial closure of the large Jaguar assembly plant at the city's Brown's Lane, previously a major source of employment in Coventry. On 4 August 2004, 12 months before the stadium's opening, it had been announced that the new stadium would be called the Jaguar Arena in a deal worth up to £7 million until 2015. However, the deal was cancelled on 17 December 2004. Jaguar did however retain naming rights to the Arena's Exhibition Hall. Ricoh's sponsorship of the new stadium was confirmed on 26 April 2005.

On 5 May 2021, it was announced that the venue would be renamed the Coventry Building Society Arena. The name change came into effect in summer 2021 as a part of a ten-year naming rights deal with the UK's second largest building society.

Fall into administration and ownership changes

On 17 October 2022, it was confirmed that Wasps Holdings, the holding company for Wasps and Wasps Netball had entered administration. They ceased trading immediately and all playing and coaching staff were made redundant. Although the stadium operator Arena Coventry Ltd. were not included in the administration, they filed a notice of intention to appoint an administrator. On 2 November 2022, it was confirmed that stadium operator Arena Coventry Limited had also applied to enter administration. Initially all scheduled events would take place as scheduled. The administration hearing took place on 17 November where it was confirmed that the arena would enter administration but also immediately fall into the ownership of Frasers Group (owned by Mike Ashley), who had a pre-signed deal to immediately take over the stadium should it fall into administration.

On 23 August 2025, Coventry City Football Club officially announced the completion of its acquisition of the Arena from the Frasers Group, thereby becoming landlords of their home stadium 20 years to date of their inaugural competitive football match played here.

Football at the arena

Coventry City

The stadium hosted its first football match in August 2005. The official opening was performed by Dame Kelly Holmes and sports minister Richard Caborn on 24 February 2007, by which time the arena had already hosted a sell-out England U21 football match against Germany as well as a full season of Coventry City matches.

The arena became the venue for Coventry City's home games at the start of the 2005–06 season, following 106 years at the Highfield Road stadium. The first competitive football match played at the stadium was against Queens Park Rangers on 20 August 2005, in front of a reduced (for safety reasons) 23,012 capacity crowd. The game ended 3–0 to Coventry, with Claus Bech Jørgensen becoming the first player to score at the arena. Hull City became the first away team to win at the Ricoh, easing their way to a 2–0 win on 24 September 2005, with both goals coming from John Welsh.

The stadium has never seen a capacity 32,600 crowd for a Coventry City match, but 2025 saw their highest attendance to date, coming against Middlesbrough in a Championship match that saw 31,452 people in attendance. Coventry City won the match 2–0.

In December 2009, the first hat-trick was scored at the venue when Freddy Eastwood scored three past Peterborough United. Eastwood grabbed two goals before half-time before Craig Mackail-Smith netted a brace in the second half to level the scoring. However, Coventry City secured three points in the Championship fixture after Eastwood grabbed the final goal of the fixture just a minute after Peterborough levelled. Freddy Eastwood remained the only player to have scored a hat-trick at the Ricoh Arena until Coventry City loanee Jacob Murphy scored a first-half hat-trick in a League One fixture against Gillingham on 21 November 2015.

On 28 July 2011, a bronze statue of Jimmy Hill was unveiled at the entrance to the stadium after £100,000 was raised by Coventry City fans. He managed the club from 1961 to 1967 and was responsible for guiding it to the top flight. Despite this, Hill decided to resign as manager for a career in television but later returned to the Sky Blues as managing director before becoming chairman. When he died in December 2015, fans paid tribute by placing flowers and scarves by and around the statue.

The quickest ever goal scored at the ground was when Coventry striker Dan Agyei converted against Northampton Town after 19.5 seconds on 4 October 2016. This beat the previous record scored by Reading's Grzegorz Rasiak after 27 seconds in 2009, when Reading defeated Coventry 3–1. Rasiak's goal still remains the fastest one scored by an away side at the stadium.

Rent dispute (2012–2013)

In December 2012, Coventry City owners SISU Capital became embroiled in a high-profile dispute with ACL over the rent arrangement and a lack of access to matchday revenue. The previously agreed rent amounted to £1.2 million per year, but did not give Coventry City access to matchday revenue.

A deadline of 27 December 2012 was given by ACL for unpaid rent. After the deadline passed, a winding up order was enforced through the High Court. Subsequently, after ACL planned to place Coventry City FC Ltd into administration, the club itself entered administration, accepting a ten-point penalty from the Football League as a consequence. A further 10-point penalty was incurred when ACL refused to accept the terms of a company voluntary arrangement (CVA) proposed by the administrator. Coventry City has since been bought by Otium Entertainment Group.

On 23 March 2013, Coventry City moved all its staff and club shop stock from the venue after a long dispute over rent and access to matchday revenue with the club.

Coventry City agreed to play their home games at Northampton Town's Sixfields Stadium to ensure that they fulfilled their fixtures. This resulted in ACL threatening to sue Northampton Town if they decided to carry on hosting Coventry City's home games. Northampton Town released a statement saying that they "will not be bullied or threatened". ACL subsequently withdrew its legal action against Northampton Town.

Second stint at the arena (2014–2019)

ACL and SISU agreed a two-year deal to bring Coventry City back to the arena in 2014. The club also had the option to play there for a further two years; they played their first match back at the stadium on 5 September 2014 against Gillingham. This followed a payment of £470,000 from SISU Capital to ACL after a Football League ruling. The deal was later extended by a year. This meant Coventry City remained at the Ricoh Arena until May 2019 before ground-sharing for two seasons with Birmingham City at St Andrew's.

Third stint at the arena (2021–present)

On 10 March 2021, It was announced that Coventry City and Wasps had agreed to a ten-year deal, which would mean that the club would return to the stadium from the 2021–22 season. The club still intend to build a new stadium on land near the University of Warwick on the southern edge of the city, as a break clause in their contract will allow them to leave the Ricoh for their new stadium. Their first game back was a pre-season friendly on 1 August against Wolverhampton Wanderers in which Coventry lost 2–1.

With the administration of Wasps and subsequent transfer of ownership of the Coventry Building Society Arena Coventry City's deal became null and void and the club did not sign to continue the deal with Frasers Group. Frasers Group issued the football club with a notice of eviction on 5 December should they choose to not sign a new deal running until May 2023. Coventry City signed the deal on 13 December agreeing to stay at the arena until at least May 2023. On 28 April 2023, it was announced that Coventry City and Frasers Group had agreed a five-year license for the club to continue to play at the Arena. It was also agreed that as part of the deal, no other sports team were to play home games at the Arena, after issues with the condition of the pitch under previous owners rugby union club Wasps.

International football

The venue hosted three England under-21 internationals. The first was a 2007 European U-21 Championship qualification play-off match against Germany on 5 October 2006. The hosts edged out the visitors 1–0 thanks to Leighton Baines' 77th-minute goal. The second was a 2011 UEFA European Under-21 Championship qualification Group 9 match against Macedonia on 9 October 2009. The hosts beat the visitors 6–3, with goals from Kieran Gibbs, Micah Richards, and two apiece from Andy Carroll and Zavon Hines. The most recent being a 3–0 win for England U21 in 2015 against Kazakhstan U21.

On 17 May 2007, England U-19 team played their home fixture against Netherlands U-19 team in the Elite qualifying group round. Netherlands won the game 2–1.

2012 Olympics

The venue also became host to 2012 Olympic Football matches, where the stadium hosted 12 tournament matches. The stadium was temporarily renamed to City of Coventry Stadium due to sponsorships on venue names not being allowed by the International Olympic Committee. In preparation for the Olympics, a test event on 23 April 2012 saw Oman play Senegal in the Olympic Qualifier play-offs. Senegal won 2–0 and took the final place in the men's 2012 Olympic draw. The first Olympic match, on 25 July 2012, was between Japan and Canada in Group F of the women's tournament. On 9 August 2012, the bronze medal game was held between France and Canada at City of Coventry Stadium. Canada won the bronze medal in a 1–0 stoppage time victory on a goal from Diana Matheson.

Source and attribution

Adapted from “Coventry Building Society Arena” by English Wikipedia contributors. Main paragraphs and sections are retained; tables, reference markers and technical markup are omitted. This is an encyclopedic adaptation, not a personal review. Original revision and contributor history ↗. Text is shared under CC BY-SA 4.0 ↗. Check current visitor access, tickets and transport with the relevant operator.