Melbourne Victory A-League Women’s team qualified for a record eight consecutive A-League Women’s Final Series and challenged for honours until the season’s penultimate weekend.
November
There was no shortage of goals as Melbourne Victory, after a squad reshape and introduction of the NPLW program, embarked on the first month of their latest title tilt.
Despite defeat at Brisbane Roar, when kick-off was delayed and then play halted by inclement weather, debut goals for off-season pick-ups Kennedy White and Rhianna Pollicina set the tone for their productive terms.
American striker White, the eventual Melbourne Victory Golden Boot winner, would hit a clinically taken hat-trick the following week, with Zoe McMeeken also scoring, when Western Sydney Wanderers were swatted aside 1-4 as the Girls in Blue started with back-to-back road games.
Returning to home soil, it was midfielder Pollicina who struck, beating Central Coast Mariners’ goalkeeper and two recovering defenders to settle a Grand Final rematch at The Home of The Matildas.
Statistical domination was not enough for even a point at Wellington Phoenix, but a reaction was forthcoming when three first-half finishes defeated Perth Glory in Melbourne, with Sofia Saklis netting her first goal for the Club.
December
Friday night football versus Canberra United, featuring an own goal apiece, would go the way of the visitors. Once more, though, Victory would respond positively, chalking up back-to-back wins.
Original Rivalry bragging rights were grabbed in an AAMI Park double-header against Adelaide, thanks to Rachel Lowe, who delivered the calibre of midfield performance for which she was named Victory medallist come season’s end.
Then a comprehensive away showing was put in at Newcastle Jets, thanks to that White-Pollicina combination firing once again and a close-range conversion from the returning Nicki Flannery off the bench.
A Christmas Derby loss combined with an impending defeat to Central Coast threatened to spoil any Christmas cheer until the completion of an improbable comeback in Gosford. Hopkins’ team, through Pollicina, Saklis and Ella O’Grady, with the Goal of the Season, scored thrice after the regulation 90 minutes to snatch a point that would be defining come the final reckoning.
The three stoppage time goals that saw us claim a late draw against the Mariners ⚽️ pic.twitter.com/vrCqSaYNul
— Melbourne Victory (@gomvfc) December 27, 2025
January
It was a lean beginning to 2026, with a solitary point taken from three outings. Brisbane snuck the win in Bundoora, Adelaide, surviving late Victory pressure, edged the visitors at Coopers Stadium in South Australia, before a stalemate in the home Big Blue got the team on the board.
February
Controversially against 10 players, and after White thumped Victory in front, Canberra took the spoils in the capital.
Fired up by that injustice, there was the requisite bounce back to complete a double over the Jets. Substitutes Alana Jancevski, directly from a corner, and Holly Furphy restored that winning feeling in front of a vibrant Shepparton crowd during the Club’s latest regional football showcase.
Valuable points against the eventual one and two, who would contest the Grand Final, Melbourne City and Wellington Phoenix, nudged the team closer to guaranteeing a top-six berth at a time when the Club celebrated Captain, Kayla Morrison, becoming its first ALW player to make a century of appearances.
March
Australia’s hosting of the AFC Women’s Asian Cup meant a reduced March fixture programme. Still, what remained brought initial success. Furphy, boosted by a Besart Berisha masterclass in training, fired in a volleyed winner against Western Sydney.
Lowe then packed her shooting boots for a trip to New South Wales, only for Sydney FC to bite back and leave the Finals fate hanging in the balance.
April
Needing a Round 22 win to make those around them on the ladder sweat, Victory delivered when it mattered most away to Perth, with Claudia Bunge’s header and Courtney Newbon’s seventh clean sheet of the season combining to clinch three points.
This nudged them ahead of Central Coast, who would rue their late collapse in December’s meeting even more when a last-day point left them behind the Girls in Blue and cut them out of the six.
If the trip to Western Australia had been all or nothing, then the hop up to ACT for an Elimination Final was do or die. Yet, against the odds, the form book was ripped up, and a bullish O’Grady brace headlined an all-time Finals performance.
May
Having knocked off third-place Canberra, the unenviable task of trying to take down the Premiers was up next. In tightly contested legs of fine margins, Victory cracked the crossbar in both, but each would end with City a goal to the good as the Girls in Blue bowed out.
