China to build its largest football stadium

A professional football stadium with a capacity of 100,000 broke ground on Thursday in south China's city of Guangzhou.

Guangzhou Evergrande will be the owner of the country's largest professional football stadium, Report says citing Xinhua.

The stadium, with a floor area of 150,000 square meters, is designed with the appearance of a blooming lotus and will be a landmark of Guangzhou, the "city of floors."

The Evergrande Group, the owner of the Guangzhou Evergrande football club, will invest a total of 12 billion yuan (1.69 billion U.S. dollars) to build the stadium and sports complex. The plot of land has an area of about 750 acres.

Xia Haijun, president of the Evergrande Group, said construction will be completed before December 2022.

"We hope the stadium will host the opening ceremony of the Asian championships in 2023," Xia said.

China will host the 2021 FIFA club world cup and 2023 Asian championships.