Sport
5 December, 2025
Push for community hub at Brierly
THE high-quality soccer pitches at Brierly Recreation Reserve need to be matched by a contemporary community centre and changerooms according to Warrnambool mayor Cr Ben Blain.
A $13 million accessible community centre, that includes changerooms and community meeting spaces, is proposed for Brierly Reserve and is one of council’s top advocacy priorities.
Cr Blain said council was looking to continue the partnership with the state government on the redevelopment at Brierly Reserve.
In 2022 the state government provided $1 million for the redevelopment of the playing surface, an amount matched by council.
Cr Blain and president of the Warrnambool Rangers Football Club, Michael Robertson, met recently to talk about the pitch upgrade and the next stage of the Brierly redevelopment, which will be the community hub.
Mr Robertson said the new soccer pitches were “terrific” and the club had made good use of the ground over their first winter playing on the upgraded surface.
“We feel like we’re half-way through the project,” Mr Robertson said.
“We’ve got the amazing pitch, the next part is the facilities.
“We hosted Football South West’s grand final here and everyone was keen to come and play on the best pitch in the league and new changerooms would definitely complement that.
“We’ve had a huge amount of growth across the whole club and particularly in female participation.
“Typically, we’ve got over 350 players and parents participating each week in winter.
“We desperately need some better female facilities … we’ve got female games back-to-back now with male games.
“Everyone needs the ability to be able to change in comfort”.
Cr Blain said the portable changerooms were a temporary solution, and a community hub would serve the fast-growing residential area in Warrnambool’s north-east along with those participating in sport.
“We’re seeing now with that growth the portable changerooms aren’t cutting it anymore; there are challenges.
“People are getting changed in cars. It’s a struggle at the moment with the facilities that we have.
“We want to see regional tournaments here and once we’ve got the missing piece, which is the changerooms and the facilities, it’s going to be a game changer because it will increase utilisation here in a huge way.”
