SOCCER FRANKSTON Pines has signed off on a $3.9 million revamp of Monterey Reserve with work to start next February. The State 3 outfit is also eyeing a deal with Melbourne Victory as part of an ambitious expansion plan that could return the club to former glory. Pines has been keen to redevelop a junior program that waned and eventually shut down around 12 years ago. Enter A-League heavyweight Victory with an offer of free weekly clinics for local primary school children. It was too good to refuse and was quickly accepted by Pines president Lee Davies. “I think it’s…
Author: Craig MacKenzie
SOCCER FOOTBALL Victoria hopes to get the green light to announce a resumption of training this month with the aim of starting the league season in June. In April Football Federation Australia extended the suspension of all soccer activities until 31 May but that looks likely to be lifted. Last week Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced that national cabinet had endorsed the “National Principles for Resumption of Sport and Recreation Activities” developed by the Australian Health Protection Principal Committee and the “Framework for Rebooting Sport in a Covid-19 Environment” developed by the Australian Institute of Sport. The AIS document sets…
SOCCER FOOTBALL Victoria may soon announce a July start to the 2020 season. Last week Prime Minister Scott Morrison said the federal government wanted to get Australians back into recreational sport “as soon as we can” and the national cabinet of state and territory leaders agreed to develop principles for sport and recreation to get consistency across the country. FV and Football Federation Australia would have to sign off on a series of bio-security measures and how they would be monitored but it increasingly looks like training could resume in June with a 22-game season starting in the first weekend…
SOCCER FRANKSTON council looks certain to approve a $1.43 million makeover of Monterey Reserve in next financial year’s budget. This was one of the major capital works projects announced last week in a proposed annual budget posted on the council’s website and inviting community feedback. It’s no secret that Monterey Reserve tenant Frankston Pines and council had been at loggerheads for some time over long-standing plans for a major makeover with the club strongly opposed to important aspects of the project. For reasons the club could never understand the original plans had public toilets at the entrance to the new…
SOCCER MICHAEL Woodward is one of the “invisible men” of local soccer. There are committee members at some clubs who have never heard of him but that’s more a reflection of how football is structured in Victoria than of the man himself. In a wide-ranging interview Football Victoria’s southern zone representative has chosen to share his personal views on the sports’ governance, clubs’ focus on their senior teams, the high cost of player fees especially at NPL junior level and what the prospects are for restarting the 2020 season. Woodward, 59, has a son and daughter that both played soccer…