FV Geelong History
The first touch points of football in Geelong arrived in the form of a charity match involving visiting HMAS Platypus and the metropolitan club Windsor in 1920. Geelong United, so called for the representation of players from all over the United Kingdom, was formed in 1923, competing in the 1924 and 1925 Metropolitan League season, before travel to and from Melbourne became onerous, but interest in the game had grown enough for the Geelong and Western Districts League to be formed in 1926, but it too would fall by the wayside come the turn of the decade. Despite the efforts of another United team performing credibly in the Metro League between 1934 and 1936, the advent of war decimated the brief boom which had taken place.
Indeed, the Geelong Amateur Soccer Association would not be formed until 1956, and the teams represented the changing face of Victoria, with clubs representing migrants from the United Kingdom, Germany, Italy, Holland, Ukraine and Hungary. Several of these clubs found their way into the Metropolitan leagues, the most successful of which was Geelong, an Italian club that climbed to the top tier State League in 1958. By 1963, the Geelong clubs, along with their regional compatriots, were banished to their local leagues as the Victorian Soccer Federation streamlined their metropolitan competitions. This resulted in the Geelong and Ballarat associations amalgamated in a partnership which lasted fifteen years.
By now, the association was known as the Western Victoria Soccer Association (WVSA), but the powerful clubs were keen to test their mettle against the Metropolitan giants, and by the time the Premier League was formed in 1991, one particularly club had returned from expulsion in 1972 to climb its way to the Victorian top-flight. Led by former Gold Medal winner Branko Culina, North Geelong would be the first club from the region to win Victoria’s premier competition in 1992, defeating Brunswick Juventus in the Grand Final with three goals in extra time.
By the turn of the century, the WVSA had grown significantly, with several new clubs from the Bellarine peninsula and surf coast adding depth from an ever-growing population base. In a landmark decision in 2010, the then Geelong Regional Football Association voted to defer administrative control to Football Federation Victoria, becoming the first regional association to do so, with twenty clubs representing the region as we move towards 2026.
Life Members
Joe Cappadona, Tony Curnick, Mujo Dzin, Cecil Earley, Paul Halliday, Joe Jakubowski, John Karounos, John Kubina, Everett Nelson, Alex Stojanovski.
Note: Football Victoria officially recognised Geelong Region Life Members as Football Victoria Life Members in 2016.
Competition Honour Roll
At present, Football Victoria is researching the history of football in regional Victoria, with particular emphasis on identifying the origins of each competition, with a view to composing an exhaustive list of League and Cup winners, to be shared early in 2026.