体坛英语新闻：Kazan World Cup football stadium turns to swimming pool

KAZAN, Russia, July 11 (Xinhua) -- As one of the venues for 2018 FIFA Football World Cup, Kazan Arena Stadium will be marked as the first ever swimming pool on a football pitch in history for the upcoming 16th FINA Swimming World Championships.

During the FINA World Championships from July 24 - August 9, the Kazan Arena Stadium will host swimming and synchronized swimming events. Two temporary 50-meter-long pools will be set up on the football pitch: one for competitions and one for practices.

Both temporary pools are installed in collaboration with Myrtha Pools, the Official FINA Pool Partner. It will have a seating capacity of 11,000, much less than previous 48,000 seats.

Ranko Tepavcevic, Secretary General of World Championships, revealed that the temporary roofs are also launched in case of the weather changes.

"It is the first time that a football stadium turns to be swimming pools. All the installation work will be done in one week. We will remove the temporary pools and roofs after the swimming worlds," Tepavcevic told Xinhua.

"The point is that our Kazan Arena Stadium can be a role model for the future usage of the stadiums. I think maybe other cities will learn from our innovation. The great idea was made by the Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko and FINA Executive Director Cornel Marculescu," he added.

Kazan Arena Stadium was launched on May 5th, 2010, when President Vladimir Putin, who was Prime Minister of the Russian Federation back then, laid the foundation stone.