Olympic Rugby Sevens at Stade de France (Loge Seats)
3.2
Rating
3.2/5
Flyctory.com Pros
Nice atmosphere
Overall, good value for money
Flyctory.com Cons
Weird seat layout
Terrible food situation on loge level
Issues entering and exiting the stadium
When we booked the tickets way before the Paris 2024 Olympics, this visit felt to become the highlight of the first weekend’s visit at the event: Business loge tickets at one of the first medal decisions, right at Stade de France. You have to say that the 200 Euro per ticket admission in the First category of the French national stadium did only include the seats on business loge level, not any kind of hospitality (and we were aware of that before). Nonetheless, I was really looking forward to this session, which took roughly six hours. Here is my review of the Men’s Rugby Sevens finals and placement matches.
Stade de France – Location & Transport
Stade de France is located in Saint Denis, one of the rather poorly reputed boroughs of Paris. Nonetheless, my wife and I majorly felt safe there. The area around the stadium has a lot of restaurants and bars around (on top of multiple vending booths). Due to the large size of the stadium, though, they were absolutely crowded. The Centre Aquatique Olympique, where water polo is played during he Paris Games, is nearby.
The stadium is served by two RER lines, D and B. If possible, I would rather recommend to go for the D line, as RER B also features the airport and can thus have quite a lot of additional traffic. Both lines can be reached from Gare du Nord. We cane from the Arena Porte de la Chapelle / Adidas Arena watching badminton and thus came by metro line 12, which is also an “official” Olympic Games way to access the place. However, walking distance from Front Populaire is some 35 minutes and needs some mobility to go for the walk. You finally pass the RER B station La Plaine – Stade de France. The security controls were friendly and quick (and rather loose). Unfortunately, getting to the business loge area had two additional ticket controls and almost took longer than getting into the stadium.
After The Matches
The handling after the gold medal match was absolutely ridiculous. First, the volunteers wanted to guide us to the absolutely wrong direction, then there were long queues as the security wanted to bring all people leaving through two turnstiles. Five to ten minutes after the match, they finally opened the gates of the stadium, so that the flow from the stadium worked better. The organisation at the train station was excellent, though.
Stade de France – The Stadium
Stade de France is a massive stadium with a capacity of some 81,000 for soccer and rugby and some 75,000 for athletics. he business loges are located right above the lower ranks. Even though we definitely did not have the best seats in that area (all loges at that rink had the same pricing level), the view was really nice and the scenery impressing. However, the video screens were a bit weird. Especially when the French national flag was in display, it reminded of the German Imperial War Flag – I definitely don’t want to have these dark times back.
Stade de France – The Loge / First Seat
There were just two entrances for the business loges. As I said above, the lines getting into that area were long. The entrance on East side was really nice and welcoming. Apart from the key loges, on the West center of the stadium, you can reach all loges from there. Our loge was very basic, like the majority of the loges. All typical loge services were removed. Only the (empty) fridge had been running for whatever reason. Some of the rooms were nicely decorated in Paris 2024 design, though – it felt a bit like the organizers did not manage to get the whole decoration done.
The key issue about our seat has been the seat layout, though. What on Earth did the architects feel when they put four rows of three seats in front of a business loge? Regardless if these were “only” the most expansive public tickets at the Olympics or a national soccer or rugby event, people typically come in groups of two. This made my wife and myself sit one behind each other and definitely decreased the enjoyment of the event. The seats as such were not as comfortable as I know that from other hospitality areas. The room behind the seats gave some place to relax and stretch legs, though. Fun fact: the drink cups used at the Olympic Games 2024 did not fit into the cupholder of the seat. That’s something I just cannot understand in a major event.
Olympic Rugby Sevens at Stade de France – Atmosphere
Even though I felt some more international attendance would have added a lot, the atmosphere in Stade de France was truly amazing. Here and there, the French fas felt a bit unfair and unsportsmanlike to the opponent and the referee, but overall, there was a really nice Rugby Sevens party in the North of Paris.
Olympic Rugby Sevens at Stade de France – Food & Merchandise
Apart from the vendors outside the stadium, there are a couple of vending booths at Stade de France. In the hospitality area, you get a stamp on your hand and can also visit these places. However, the routes from the loges are really long and not attractive. The more, it was really a disgrace that the whole loge area on our side just had two vending booths for food. Several items like some sandwiches, hot dogs and other items were already sold out, so that the anyway very limited supply of food was even more limited. This is not acceptable in my point of view for the most expansive free seats in the venue.
Vending booths for merchandise were located around the stadium. I felt that the number of spots was not sufficient. This opinion is also based on the long queues in front of these vending booths.
Olympic Rugby Sevens at Stade de France – Services
In contrast to other places I have been, the business loges did not feature own toilets. Instead, there were scattered bathrooms on the level. They definitely felt too low in regards of volume. For example, on the men’s side, there was just one seated toilet in each of the bathroom (wheelchair accessible), on top of three urinals. Like in many Olympic venues, security and staff refused to speak English (even though they felt to understand it).
Olympic Rugby Sevens at Stade de France (Loge Seating) – My View
Apart from some weak spots, I really liked watching Rugby Sevens at the Paris Olympics. The atmosphere was fun. However, the organisation around the business loges was an absolute mess. Somehow, the setting was a bit of more relaxed, but from architectural weirdness to service issues, I just felt too many problems at Stade de France. That’s really a shame.
