Future of the sports industry discussed at LALIGA Extra Time event

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LALIGA EXTRA TIME
Image credit: LALIGA

The first edition of ‘LALIGA Extra Time’ was recently held in Melbourne at the end of last month.

The event, organised by LALIGA, looked to bring together experts from the sports and entertainment industry in a two-panel format. It also served to introduce the new identity of LALIGA.

The LALIGA Extra Time event included the participation of Villarreal CF, EA Sports, Optus Sport and Matildas international footballer Elise Kellond-Knight.

“We are proud to have been able to publicly present here in Melbourne LALIGA’s revolutionary new identity to the biggest players in the country’s sports and entertainment industry. For us it is not just a change of symbol, but the symbol of change: with a new partner like EA SPORTS, with a profound transformation in the strategy, positioning, business, technology and audio-visual broadcasts… As we all have been able to enjoy during the first exciting matchdays of LALIGA EA SPORTS and LALIGA Hypermotion in the season 2023/24 that recently started,” stated Glen Rolls via media release, LALIGA delegate for Australia and New Zealand.

The first panel focused on the digital transformation of football, and how partners, broadcasters and rights holders are working collaboratively to the grow the sport across the world.

Theresa Bray, EA Sports’ Head of Marketing and Communication ANZ & Emerging Markets, and Aaron Lea, Associate Director of Digital Media & Platforms at Optus Sport were involved in the panel discussion. Bray expanded on the recent partnership between LALIGA and EA Sports, as well as the ever-changing viewing habits of the younger generation. She claimed that the partnership between the two companies was exciting for EA Sports, as it brings together two global brands that have a strong focus on innovation and authenticity.

Lea explained that Optus Sport, who broadcasts LALIGA in Australia, have focused heavily on displaying the competitions across the company’s digital and social platforms in an effort to find new and increased audiences.

“LALIGA content is playing a key role in our shortform digital video strategy, and we’ve seen strong viral engagement across YouTube Shorts, Tiktok and Instagram Reels,” Lea added via media release.

The second panel focused on the future of football and the vital importance of having a well-constructed foundation in grassroots football, in order to be successful at the elite levels of the sport.

LALIGA clubs are well aware of this notion, as within the competition itself it gave the most playing time to youth players out of the top five major European leagues this past season (this equated to 17.2% of the minutes in 2022/23, according to a CIES study).

One of the LALIGA clubs with the best youth development structures across the world is Villarreal CF. In 2021, they became Europa League champions – becoming the smallest city ever to win a European trophy. The club have a strong presence within Australia, with Nano Márquez, Villarreal’s International Academies Coordinator, attesting to this.

“Australia is a very important market for Villarreal CF as we have three academies in Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane all of which focus on the development and growth of the players with the hope that this contributes to the local football ecosystem as well as opening up possibilities in Spain,” he said.

The future of the women’s game was also discussed heavily through this panel section. The success of the recent World Cup in Australia and New Zealand, where Spain beat England in the final in Sydney, was huge boost to the women’s game.

Australian international player Elise Kellond-Knight shared her experiences and expectations for the future during the event.

“The Women’s World Cup was incredible as it brought everyone together here in Australia to cheer on the Matildas and celebrate football. Spanish football has always been very technical and skilful and perhaps lack what we talk about in Australia to be ‘physical’,” she said.

“However, in the World Cup we saw a very complete Spanish team with not only the skills and technical ability, but also the physicality with the likes of Salma Paralluelo, who in my opinion played a decisive role in helping Spain lift the trophy.”

This first edition of LALIGA Extra Time event in Melbourne also featured the trophy of the “LALIGA EA SPORTS” champions and the 2023/24 Puma LALIGA ball.

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Football West’s Female Football Week draws record engagement from Metropolitan Perth to Remote Kunurra

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Image Credit: Football West

Football West has wrapped up its 2026 Female Football Week with activations spanning metropolitan Perth, regional Western Australia and national online platforms, as participation data from the state’s most remote football association underlined the scale of demand for women’s and girls’ football beyond the city.

Kununurra Soccer Association, situated in the East Kimberley more than 3,000 kilometres from Perth, recorded 47 new female registrations aged 7 to 12 across the first two terms of 2026 through Football West’s Junior Girls United program, representing a 30 percent increase in female membership that coaches Hannah Grominsky and Evie Marchetti described as overwhelming.

“The support from the community has been simply awesome,” Grominsky said. “We’re up to nearly 50 registered girls now. The majority of them have never played before or aren’t part of our association, so it’s great to give them a positive football experience in a comfortable environment.”

The program, supported by the Federal Government’s Play Our Way grant, now runs every Wednesday and has extended football activity into the cooler months of the Kimberley calendar, a season when the association would not traditionally operate. The result is a cohort of players new to the game, in a region where access to organised sport has historically been constrained by geography, infrastructure and seasonality.

Recognition across the state

Back in Perth, Female Football Week’s centrepiece event was the Women in Football Celebrate You Breakfast at the Sam Kerr Football Centre, featuring two panel discussions covering officiating pathways, coaching development and advocacy for women in football.

Subiaco AFC NPL Women’s head coach Christine Coppin, who is one of few women coaching at her level in the region, said events like the breakfast were critical to making the pathway visible for others.

“I’d love to see more women coaches putting their hat in the ring, both at junior and senior levels, realising that there’s more to football than just playing,” Coppin said. “They can stay involved in the sport as they get older in different ways.”

A regional Women in Football Breakfast in Albany drew more than 30 attendees, while a Girls Day Out event in the same city attracted more than 50 participants aged 6 to 16 for a come-and-try introduction to the game, extending the week’s reach into the Great Southern and reinforcing Football West’s stated commitment to building women’s football outside metropolitan areas.

Recognising those who make it happen

The week’s awards, nominated by the WA public, recognised five individuals whose contributions to female football across the state were judged most significant over the past year. Cassandra Paxman of Albany Rovers FC was named Coach of the Year, Georgia Whitelaw of Great Southern JSA and Albany JSA took Referee of the Year, Karen Harris of Carramar Shamrock Rovers FC was named Volunteer of the Year, Georgia Aiesi of Mandurah City FC received the Player of the Year award, and Melissa Spillman of Football Futures Foundations was named Community Champion of the Year— a recognition she also received at the national level.

Football West Female Football and Advocacy Manager Sarah Carroll said the week had reinforced both the momentum and the responsibility facing the sport.

“Female Football Week continues to showcase the incredible passion and growing appetite for the women’s game,” Carroll said. “It’s a reminder of how important it is that we keep working together to drive the game forward.”

The contrast between a packed breakfast at the Sam Kerr Football Centre and a Wednesday afternoon program in Kununurra working around wet season schedules captures something essential about where women’s football in Western Australia actually lives. The growth is real, and it is happening in places the cameras do not always reach.

Tasmania’s State Budget Commits $350,000 to Football Facility Planning as $80 million Home of Football Moves Closer to Reality

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Image Credit: Football Tasmania

The Tasmanian State Government has committed $350,000 in seed funding for the next stage of planning for Football Tasmania‘s proposed Home of Football, moving the state’s most significant football infrastructure project closer to construction and signalling political recognition that demand for rectangular facilities in Tasmania has outgrown what currently exists.

The funding, confirmed in the 2026-27 State Budget handed down last week, sits within an almost $200 million investment in sport and recreation across the budget and forward estimates: a package the government describes as designed to improve access and participation for Tasmanians of all ages. The football allocation is listed alongside a $25 million community sporting infrastructure commitment at Kingborough, $12.5 million for new multipurpose indoor sporting courts at New Town Bay, and $8 million for the Domain Tennis Centre redevelopment.

Football Tasmania CEO Tony Pignata OAM welcomed the commitment as an acknowledgement of the structural gap between participation numbers and available infrastructure, particularly in the state’s south.

“The State Government’s delivery on this commitment shows us that they understand that demand outstrips supply for rectangular facilities in the state,” Pignata said. “If we are to continue to grow and develop future Matildas and Socceroos, we need to invest in the infrastructure our game so desperately needs.”

The proposed $80 million facility would include six full-sized pitches, three synthetic and three turf, alongside four five-a-side pitches, modern changerooms for both men and women, and dedicated training facilities. The design is intended to serve every level of the game simultaneously, from grassroots junior competitions through to national-level tournaments.

From grassroots to A-League ambitions

Football Tasmania has framed the facility’s purpose across a deliberately wide range of uses. At the community end, it would provide a permanent home for junior games and regional tournaments that currently compete for limited rectangular ground availability across the state. At the elite end, it would create the capacity to host national competitions including the Emerging Matildas and Emerging Socceroos Championships, flagship state competitions such as the Statewide Cup finals, and potentially, in time, an A-League team.

That last ambition is the most significant and the most distant. Pignata was measured but direct in raising it, situating a Tasmanian A-League club alongside the NBL’s Jackjumpers, the WNBL’s Jewels and the AFL’s Devils as part of the state’s emerging identity as a home for national sporting competition.

“One day down the track, we anticipate this would become home to our very own A-League team, so that we take our rightful place in the nation’s elite competition,” he said.

The pathway from planning funding to A-League admission is long and would require sustained political and commercial support well beyond the current commitment. But the logic is consistent with how football infrastructure investment has worked elsewhere in Australia. The facility comes first, and the competitive pathway follows. Without a purpose-built ground that meets the standards required for elite competition, the conversation about an A-League team cannot begin in earnest.

The equity dimension

The inclusion of modern women’s and men’s changerooms in the facility’s design carries more weight than it might appear. Community and semi-professional football facilities across Australia have historically been built to male standards, with women’s changerooms added as afterthoughts or not included at all. That inadequacy has been consistently identified as a barrier to female participation and to the hosting of women’s competitions at venues that cannot accommodate them properly.

A purpose-built facility that treats women’s infrastructure as a design requirement rather than a retrofit positions the Home of Football to serve the growth of women’s football in Tasmania in a way that existing facilities cannot. The state recorded 41,395 registered football participants in 2025, a number that has been growing and that the current rectangular facility stock was not built to support at this scale.

Additionally, the government’s Ticket to Play program, which provides eligible children with two vouchers worth up to $100 each for sporting participation, and the Ticket to Wellbeing program offering $100 vouchers to eligible seniors, represent indirect but meaningful support for football participation across the state’s communities.

Pignata also acknowledged outgoing Football Tasmania President Bob Gordon, who he said had dedicated almost a decade to the organisation and had been instrumental in lobbying for this and other facilities across the state.

The $350,000 planning commitment is a beginning. The $80 million facility it is intended to progress remains subject to further government investment and development approval.

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