‘Australia’s best football academy’ coming to Footscray Park

A new Melbourne Victory football academy will be built at Footscray Park, further enhancing Victoria University’s position as a world-leading sport university.
Thursday 19 April 2018

A new Melbourne Victory football academy will be built at Footscray Park, further enhancing Victoria University’s position as a world-leading sport university.

The new academy strengthens a decade-long High Performance Sport partnership with the football club.

The facilities will be built in partnership with the State Government and City of Maribyrnong to enhance community engagement in football and higher education, and bring the communities of the West even closer together.

“By having the football facilities adjacent to Victoria University Sports Precinct, Victory's Women's and Academy teams will have even more access to the University's Sports Science staff, students and High Performance resources.”
– Professor Hans Westerbeek

Melbourne Victory Chairman Anthony Di Pietro is excited by what the new academy will mean for football and the opportunities it will bring to the entire community.

“It’s a great day for football, it’s a great day for Melbourne Victory, it’s a great day for boys and girls who will be participating in all of our W-League and our junior football programs,” said Mr Di Pietro.

“We have training and playing facilities that will now be built here at Footscray Park. We’ll have a synthetic pitch, a grass pitch, and we’ll play all of our W-League and NPL games here.

“It’s going to be well worth the wait. We are going to have Australia’s best football academy.

“This will be the centre of excellence for football, for Melbourne Victory and, we believe, for football in Victoria.”