The MCG and beyond: A look at Melbourne’s cricket grounds

While Melbourne may have one of the most iconic cricket stadiums in the world, the MCG isn’t the only cricket venue in this sports-mad city to host significant cricket games.

The city of Melbourne is renowned for its love of sport, major stadiums and spectators packing them out for big events. Cricket is no exception, with numerous famous venues and consistently big crowds attending matches.

With the rise of the Big Bash League and women’s cricket in recent years, more matches are being played, which means more venues are required to host matches.

The Melbourne Cricket Ground is one of the largest cricket stadiums in the world with its 100,000 capacity and while all major matches are played at the venue, it’s not the only major stadium in the city hosting games. Across town at Marvel Stadium, the Docklands venue hosts BBL matches each year and in the past has also hosted a handful of international matches.

Melbourne now has a quality year-round cricket facility with the redevelopment of the historic Junction Oval in recent years. The venue is also set to host its first BBL match this coming season.

While there are countless smaller cricket grounds around Melbourne, it’s these three venues we’ll focus on in this article.

Melbourne Cricket Ground

Located near Melbourne’s CBD in Yarra Park, the Melbourne Cricket Ground (pictured above) is one of the most iconic venues in world cricket. It hosts the Boxing Day Test each year which attracts the biggest crowds in the world for a Test Cricket match, especially when England tour for the Ashes Series, as they will this coming summer. It also hosts international one-day and T20 matches for the Australian cricket team. Domestically, it is the home of the Melbourne Stars in the BBL, while the Victorian Bushrangers play some of their home matches at the stadium.

The MCG has hosted matches since 1853, when the then 15-year-old Melbourne Cricket Club was forced by the government to move from its former site because the route of Australia’s first steam train was to pass through the oval. Since then, it has been developed various times into the mega stadium it is today. As well as cricket, it also hosts Australian football as well as occasional rugby league, union and football matches.

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Marvel Stadium

Marvel Stadium was built in the heart of Melbourne in 2000 as a true multi-purpose venue. While it most commonly hosts Australian football with five AFL teams playing their home games at the 56,000-capacity stadium, it has hosted many other sports, including cricket. Each summer, the Melbourne Renegades BBL team are based out of the Docklands venue, with the added bonus of being able to close the retractable roof if rain is forecast, meaning games are always guaranteed to go ahead.

In 2005, the stadium hosted three one-day matches for the controversial ICC Super Series, which was played between Australia and the World XI – made up of the world’s best cricket players. Australia won all three matches (and the Test Match which was played in Sydney). The matches attracted small crowds and were not competitive, in part because the World XI had only one warm-up game to gel as a team. Additionally, the stadium has hosted a further nine one-day internationals featuring the Australia team between 2000 and 2006. Other sports played at the stadium include soccer, rugby league, rugby union and even basketball and boxing.

As we look back at the history of the Marvel Stadium, it reveals something that admires us about its creation. It was built on a dormant wasteland of Melbourne, the former shipping docks to service the city; the place was the perfect location for constructing the new stadium. The area boasts outstanding access being so central, with undoubtably the best public transport access of any major stadium in Australia, while car parking and roads were created from scratch.

Junction Oval

The Junction Oval is located at Albert Park in St Kilda and is Melbourne year-round cricket facility and home of Cricket Victoria. A former Australian football venue with history dating back to 1856, it received a major $40 million redevelopment between 2015 and 2018, to convert it into a purpose-built cricket facility and the headquarters of Cricket Victoria. The venue is commercially known as the CitiPower Centre due to a naming-rights sponsorship.

It features two historic grandstands, a beautiful grass hill and a capacity of around 7,000. While it’s a far cry from the record crowd of 46,973 that attended the ground in 1950 for a VFL game between St Kilda and Carlton, it’s now the perfect boutique cricket venue. The oval hosted matches during last year’s ICC Women’s T20 World Cup, regular Victorian Bushrangers, WBBL and Australian women’s matches, and this year, it’ll host its first BBL game, with the Melbourne Stars hosting the Perth Scorchers on January 2.

With its mix of huge stadiums and newly-renovated boutique venues, Melbourne has fantastic facilities for cricket at every level.