Unfinished Sao Paulo stadium handed to Corinthians

The stadium set to host the opening match of this year’s World Cup in Brazil has been handed over to owners Corinthians unfinished.

The Arena de Sao Paulo was the scene of a horrific crane collapse in November, which killed two construction workers, and the 68,000 capacity stadium was officially given to Sao Paulo-based club Corinthians on Tuesday.

Despite the stadium and its surrounding area remaining unfinished less than two months before it is set to host Brazil against Croatia to open the World Cup finals, project manager and former Corinthians president Andres Sanchez attempted to allay fears surrounding completion.

“We are delivering the stadium today but there is some work left to do, not only cleaning and security, but other preparation as well,” Sanchez said.

“But this is nothing big and we will conclude everything in the next 15 days.

“Then the stadium will be ready for the World Cup. After that we will start our works again thinking on Corinthians needs for the stadium and this will last until December next year. But there is not much left as you can see.”

Sanchez also reserved a special comment for the media, which he believes have been overly negative about construction safety at the Arena de Sao Paulo.

“You can rest easy as nothing is going to fall on anyone’s head,” he said.

The first official match is set for May 17 when the home club will host Figueirense in the Brazil Serie A.