Melbourne in Victoria, Australia, is often selected and thought to be the sports capital of the world. Melbourne is second largest city in Australia yet were voted the sporting capital in the decade in 2016. The people of Melbourne are generally sports crazy and it is not important just what the sport is, the crowds in Melbourne come out for it.
So why is the city the sports capital and just how did it become the sports capital? To begin with, Melbourne features a vibrant sporting past and tradition. Melbourne was founded in 1835 and sport became a aspect of city daily life starting from then, with the Melbourne Cricket Club (MCC) becoming formed in 1838. The now well known Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG) launched in 1853. It is still presently there and it is now the largest sized sports arena in that part of the world. Different types of football grew to become also preferred in the cities beginning years, ultimately resulting in its own sport – Australian Rules Football, or ‘footy’ as it is called by the residents. The initial Melbourne Cup horse competition occured in 1861 and it is still held. The first Australian tennis championships happened in 1905 and it is still held in Melbourne. The city hosted the 1956 Olympic Games.
Local community sport is known as a important part of the Melbourne way of life and participation rates in the city are some of the highest globally. This is certainly quickly witnessed each weekend you can observe just how prominent community sports is with people actively taking part and viewing a wide range of sports activities for example cricket, tennis games, footy, rugby, netball, basketball, baseball, golfing as well as soccer. These sports play an important part of so many people’s community lives and wellness. When individuals in Melbourne are not actively playing sport, they are fans of enjoying sport. The Australian Football League grand final pulls 100 000 fans to the MCG. Rugby Union is not a well-known or a common sport in the city, but Melbourne stills hold the record for the greatest number of fans to go to watch a game!
In addition to the 1956 Olympic Games, Melbourne continues to hold international professional sports. Every year, there is the Formula 1 Australian Grand Prix, the Australian Open Tennis Grand Slam, the Spring Horse racing Carnival, the MotoGP, the Boxing Day cricket international match as well as the Rip Curl Pro surfing competition. There are the key AFL, National Rugby League, or Australian A-League (soccer) games on most weekends. There have recently been various other significant one-off events like the Commonwealth Games, the Cricket World Cup, World swimming championships and also Asian Cup soccer.
All of this is sustained by a number of world class sports stadiums such as The Melbourne Cricket Ground, the Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre, Melbourne Park, Rod Laver Arena, AAMI Park, Hisense Arena, Etihad Stadium, Flemington Racecourse, State Netball and Hockey Centre, Margaret Court Arena and the Melbourne Grand Prix Circuit and that is an infrastructure which is not near to being surpassed by any other place in the world. You can certainly see how and why Melbourne stands out as the sports capital of the world and exactly why sports activity is unquestionably included in the life style around Australia.