The Adelaide Oval is a sports ground in Adelaide, South Australia, located in the parklands between the city centre and North Adelaide. The venue is predominantly used for cricket and Australian rules football, but has also played host to rugby league, rugby union, soccer, tennis among other sports as well as regularly being used to hold concerts. Austadiums.com described Adelaide Oval as being "one of the most picturesque Test cricket grounds in Australia, if not the world." After the completion of the ground's most recent redevelopment in 2014, sports journalist Gerard Whateley described the venue as being "the most perfect piece of modern architecture because it's a thoroughly contemporary stadium with all the character that it's had in the past."
The renovated Adelaide Oval in 2015
Adelaide Oval's western grandstand was redeveloped in 2010 retaining significant portions of the George Giffen stand (1882), Sir Edwin Smith stand (1922) and Mostyn Evan stand (1920s) structural facades.
Adelaide Oval in 2014
The Adelaide Oval scoreboard during an Ashes Test
The Adelaide Park Lands comprise the figure-eight configuration of land, spanning both banks of the River Torrens between Hackney and Thebarton, which encloses and separates the City of Adelaide area from the surrounding suburbia of greater metropolitan Adelaide, the capital city of South Australia. They were laid out by Colonel William Light in his design for the city, and originally consisted of 2,300 acres (930 ha) "exclusive of 32 acres (13 ha) for a public cemetery". One copy of Light's plan shows areas for a cemetery and a Post and Telegraph Store on West Terrace, a small Government Domain and Barracks on the central part of North Terrace, a hospital on East Terrace, a Botanical Garden on the River Torrens west of North Adelaide, and a school and a storehouse south-west of North Adelaide.
Aerial view of South Park Lands showing Parks 20, 21, 22 & Whitmore Square in the lower right.
Rymill Park / Murlawirrapurka (Park 14), a popular part of the Park Lands
Flower bed in Pinky Flat / Tarntanya Wama (Park 26)
Gum trees and a creek in Park 20