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Skinner Reserve
Skinner Reserve is an Australian rules football, cricket and soccer venue located in the Melbourne suburb of Braybrook. It is most notable as the former home ground of the Sunshine Football Club in the Victorian Football Association (VFA).
Prior to Skinner Reserve being developed as a football ground, the primary sports venue in the City of Sunshine was Selwyn Park in Albion. In 1964, the local council agreed to lease Selwyn Park to George Cross FC, which was playing in Victoria's top-level soccer league at the time. However, the Sunshine Football Club (SFC), as well as local baseball and sub-district cricket clubs, still had three years to run on their lease.
To secure agreement from the SFC to end the lease, the Sunshine City Council committed to developing a new VFA-standard venue at Skinner Reserve. The venue was built during the 1965 season, with the football club signing a seven-year lease that begun in 1966.
Before construction was finished, the Footscray Football Club – which was competing in the Victorian Football League (VFL) – made an application to the council to permanently move its playing and administrative base from Western Oval to the new venue and develop it into a VFL-standard ground. At the time, fellow VFL clubs St Kilda and North Melbourne had recently moved their bases to VFA venues (Moorabbin Oval and Coburg City Oval respectively). The council ultimately honoured its existing agreement with the Sunshine Football Club and rejected Footscray's application.
The ground was named after Henry Robert Skinner, who served as the mayor of Sunshine for one term in 1952.
Sunshine played its first VFA match at Skinner Reserve on 23 April 1966, losing to Prahran by four points. The venue had a very wide playing surface, high grassed embankments for spectators, and a grandstand – narrow, but quite tall by suburban standards – named the J. A. Chigwidden Stand, after long-serving club secretary Jack Chigwidden.
In addition to Sunshine's home matches, Skinner Reserve hosted VFA seconds/reserves finals matches, including several grand finals. VFL clubs often pre-season matches at the ground because it was not used for cricket during much of its history, rendering it available during summer.
Floodlights were installed at the ground in 1987 to enable matches to be played at night, although the only such VFA premiership match to be scheduled was cancelled due to the forfeiture of Sunshine's opponent, Caulfield, for unrelated reasons.
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Skinner Reserve
Skinner Reserve is an Australian rules football, cricket and soccer venue located in the Melbourne suburb of Braybrook. It is most notable as the former home ground of the Sunshine Football Club in the Victorian Football Association (VFA).
Prior to Skinner Reserve being developed as a football ground, the primary sports venue in the City of Sunshine was Selwyn Park in Albion. In 1964, the local council agreed to lease Selwyn Park to George Cross FC, which was playing in Victoria's top-level soccer league at the time. However, the Sunshine Football Club (SFC), as well as local baseball and sub-district cricket clubs, still had three years to run on their lease.
To secure agreement from the SFC to end the lease, the Sunshine City Council committed to developing a new VFA-standard venue at Skinner Reserve. The venue was built during the 1965 season, with the football club signing a seven-year lease that begun in 1966.
Before construction was finished, the Footscray Football Club – which was competing in the Victorian Football League (VFL) – made an application to the council to permanently move its playing and administrative base from Western Oval to the new venue and develop it into a VFL-standard ground. At the time, fellow VFL clubs St Kilda and North Melbourne had recently moved their bases to VFA venues (Moorabbin Oval and Coburg City Oval respectively). The council ultimately honoured its existing agreement with the Sunshine Football Club and rejected Footscray's application.
The ground was named after Henry Robert Skinner, who served as the mayor of Sunshine for one term in 1952.
Sunshine played its first VFA match at Skinner Reserve on 23 April 1966, losing to Prahran by four points. The venue had a very wide playing surface, high grassed embankments for spectators, and a grandstand – narrow, but quite tall by suburban standards – named the J. A. Chigwidden Stand, after long-serving club secretary Jack Chigwidden.
In addition to Sunshine's home matches, Skinner Reserve hosted VFA seconds/reserves finals matches, including several grand finals. VFL clubs often pre-season matches at the ground because it was not used for cricket during much of its history, rendering it available during summer.
Floodlights were installed at the ground in 1987 to enable matches to be played at night, although the only such VFA premiership match to be scheduled was cancelled due to the forfeiture of Sunshine's opponent, Caulfield, for unrelated reasons.