Melbourne Victory’s Senior and Junior Academy Teams have both been in competitive action over the last three months in their respective NPL competitions. Academy Operations Manager Damir Kulas provides an update on how both programs have performed so far this season.
Senior Academy
The Senior NPL team returned to Victoria’s top-flight for the first time since 2016 following back-to-back winning promotion campaigns in VPL2 (2023) and VPL1 (2024), the latter as Champions.
After 11 rounds, the team sits in ninth place with 12 points having won and drawn three games so far this season, which includes 3 wins from their last 6 matches.
The experienced Boris Seroshtan was named Senior Academy Technical Manager in the off-season and together with Senior Assistant Coach Matt Sultana has introduced several new players into the team.
Players such as John Radimisis (2007), Patrick Wall (2007) and Alexi Houridis (2008) have made their senior competitive debuts over the first 10 rounds while Luka Didulica, Raymond Diho, Stasi Georgakopoulos, Tobenna Obani and Parker Williams have made their Senior NPL debuts for the club.
A-League players Daniel Graskoski, Josh Inserra, Luka Kolic (whose rabona goal in a recent game went viral), Alex Menelaou, Jing Reec and Christian Siciliano have also featured for the team.
Goals have been shared across the playing squad with Daniel Lazarevski, Tommaso Minutoli and the aforementioned Wall all scoring three times so far this season while Jordan Hoey and Jack Mihailidis have both netted twice.
The boys return to action on Monday 5 May 2025 when they host Hume City at Home of the Matildas, with kick-off scheduled at 8pm.
The U23s currently sit first on the ladder after accumulating 25 points from their opening 11 games while also having the competition’s best attack (39 goals) and equal best defence (12 goals conceded).
Junior Academy
For the fourth consecutive season, all four of Melbourne Victory’s Junior Academy teams qualified for Tier One of the Junior Boys NPL regular season which commences on Sunday 4 May 2025.
In a format change, the U18s junior age category was replaced with the U17s junior age category to complement the existing junior age categories – U14s, U15s and U16s.
All four teams finished at the top of the competition standings after 11 rounds of football in the pre-qualification (grading) phase in JBNPL North.
Furthermore, each team won 10 out of 11 grading games, with the U15s, U16s and U17s all finishing the pre-qualification phase undefeated.
A total of 235 goals were scored across 44 games (5.3 goals scored per game) while only 27 goals were conceded (0.6 goals conceded per game).
This Junior Academy season has seen greater opportunities for players to play across multiple age groups, with 39 new players also making their debuts for the club.
The Junior Boys NPL regular season has also undergone a format change and is now a 16-team competition featuring 15 rounds, followed by a finals series commencing in mid-August.
Junior Academy Players: Ali Abili, Liam Alexopoulos, Eric Atanasovski, Adam Awad, Dane Brkljacic, Luke Bui (GK), Levi Buttigieg, Raphael Caligiuri, Emilio Cevizovic (GK), Lachlan Clarke, Jobe Davies (GK), Zac Davis, Daniel De Filippo, Damon Dichiera, Nikolas Didulica, Marcus Elezovic, Luka Erakovic, George Filis, Ben Gacsal, Lucas Gelgec, Ethan Gemetzis, Alexander Gouvoussis, James Gouvoussis, Anton Gray, Hasnain Jawad, Luka Jovanovic, Eli Kaminski, Jonathan Karambelas, Elwood Kingston, Nicholas Koussoulas, Jacob Kovacevic, Liam Lancaster, Christian La Rosa, Callum Lehmann, Christian Lykopoulos, Ritchie Mahon, Dylan McAleer, Kai McClurg, Cristian Miano, Max Mihailidis, Alexandru Miter, Masood Mohammadi, Xavier Munaretti, Joshua Musso, Cian O’Flynn, Pavlos Pavlou, Lucas Pitruzzello, Liam Pothuwila, Justin Rametta, James Rashio, Branko Ratkovic, Ethan Ristevski, Ahmed Rjoub, Baxter Romanovski, Roy Romanovski, Joe Roper, Aydin Sakaci, Dilhan Sakaci, Kalen Sapolu (GK), Xavier Schlegel, Keigo Shimokawa, Orpheus Sidiroglou, Artie Spyropoulos, Yianni Spyropoulos, Jordan Stavrou, Luka Stevanovic, Anthony Suleman, Archie Thomas, Luca Thomas (GK), Indie Thomas-Parker (GK), Efe Topcu, Jude Tortosa, George Tsianakas, Martin Watts, Theo Widianto, Jorgie Zarogiannis, Harper Zwiers.
Junior Academy Coaching Staff: Johnathan Mikho, Kristian Popovic, Stan Roumpos, Jake ten Hacken, Jack Aldis, Luke Hannah, Paul Iakovakis, Peter Kofinas, Will Meadows.
