AFL Barwon can confirm the dates for the supported community themed rounds for 2024.

The community awareness rounds supported by AFL Barwon align to the corporate social responsibility plan with dates aligning to the AFL themed rounds.

The selected themed rounds are fantastic opportunities for the AFL Barwon community to get behind these key initiatives and causes that resonate with our members. 

May 13^th – May 18^th – The Sir Doug Nicholls Round (AFL Barwon Indigenous Round)

May 27^th – June 2^nd – AFL Barwon Female Festival of Sport

June 10^th - June 16^th – AFL Barwon Pride Round

July 15^th – July 21^st – Hamlan Homes Read the Play and Mental Health Round

Clubs who are supporting these rounds by wearing alternative uniforms, holding fundraising events or other supported methods are asked to contact AFL Barwon Commercial Partnerships & Communications Manager, Sean Atkinson.

AFL Barwon is excited to announce the Dow Bellarine Football Netball League fixture for the 2024 season.

The 2024 season kicks off on the traditional Easter Weekend with a Portarlington hosting Newcomb on Good Friday in the standard time slot followed by Modewarre & Geelong Amateur in the twilight senior football match.

East Saturday has the repeat of last season’s Senior Football Grand Finalists, with Torquay hosting Drysdale at McCartney Oval.

2023 Dow A-Grade Premiers Ocean Grove, kick off their title defence against Preliminary Finalists Queenscliff.

The bye weekends in the Bellarine FNL in 2024 are Saturday May 11^th and Saturday July 6th. 

Other key fixture highlights include:

• Round 1 - Portarlington vs Newcomb and Modewarre vs Geelong Amateur on Good Friday, 
• Round 4 – First edition of the “Battle of the Bridge” for 2023 with Round 13 hosting the return fixture.
• Round 5 – Traditional ANZAC Day fixture between Portarlington vs Drysdale.
• Round 6 - Geelong Amateurs host A-Grade Premiers Ocean Grove in the Grand Final rematch. 

The full 2024 Dow Bellarine Football Netball League season fixture can be found here.

Buckleys Entertainment Centre has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting community sports in the region by extending its partnership with AFL Barwon until 2025.

The renewed agreement will mark 30 years of collaboration between Buckleys and AFL Barwon in 2024.

Throughout challenging times for the region, Buckleys has consistently provided financial support to AFL Barwon and its clubs, notably making a $500,000 donation in 2020 to assist clubs affected by COVID-19 shutdowns.

As part of the extended partnership, Buckleys will maintain its naming rights for the Reserves and B-Grade competitions in the Bellarine and Geelong Football Netball Leagues.

In the extended partnership, new club runner’s outfits will be provided for all Senior, Reserves, Under 18's Male Competitions, and Senior & Under 19's Female Clubs in the upcoming season.

Furthermore, Buckleys' outstanding and recently renovated facilities are set to remain the venue for all AFL Barwon end-of-season League Presentation evenings for the next two years.

Buckleys Entertainment Centre, Chair Bill Brebner expressed the organisation's pride in their ongoing financial support for AFL Barwon.

“Buckleys is proud of the continued financial support that we are able to provide to AFL Barwon through sponsorship of the Geelong FNL, Bellarine FNL & Junior Football, and the positive impacts this has on our region.”

AFL Barwon Regional General Manager Edward Wilson was thankful for the ongoing support from Buckleys,

“AFL Barwon is grateful for the continued support and engagement Buckleys continues to provide to our affiliated Clubs. We’re pleased to continue the long-term partnership that significantly supports several competitions and participation opportunities across the region, for both Football & Netball”.

To make a booking at Buckleys Entertainment Centre simply email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or phone: (03) 5248 4866.

AFL Barwon is in unanimous support of the statement made by City of Greater Geelong Mayor Trent Sullivan on Friday December 8^th that there is a clear need to urgently progress the development of additional netball infrastructure in the Region.

The AFL Barwon Strategic Plan outlines a key strategic pillar that has a focus to “strengthen, ignite and support participation opportunities across every aspect of football and netball, to ensure all competitions thrive and have inequitable opportunities addressed”.

Netball participation numbers over the past 10 years has increased from 3100 to over 5700 participants playing in all AFL Barwon competitions. The past 12 months alone has incurred a rise of 9.4% across all AFL Barwon competitions. Team numbers in all competitions has risen from 335 in 2013, to 705 in 2023. There has been a severe lack of infrastructure development or improvements over this time to support the growth in participation. The lack of facility support, and developments means some teams are on a training rotation roster.

This growth in our competition could have been significantly higher with some team entries being denied due to being at facility capacity. AFL Barwon has also not had the opportunity to expand on diversifying competitions offerings. The capacity issues also led to All Abilities competitions being administered outside of AFL Barwon governance.

The Barwon region has recorded increases in Netball participation each year since the Covid-19 pandemic. This is not only due to the competitions being provided, but also assisted by the strong growth corridors in the region. The population increase in the Greater Geelong region is projected to rise by over 63,000 by 2033, and by around 114,000 people in 2041. If our netball competitions increase by even 1% of the projected population growth over the next 10 years, we will have a projected increase of approximately 630 participants and roughly 63 teams.

The pathway and elite netball opportunities in the Barwon region are further significantly hampered with the lack of infrastructure development. The obvious lack of Stadia and surrounding infrastructure to support or showcase elite Netball such the Geelong Netball Club programs. This has also led to our own representative netball programs having no adequate facilities to train. The lack of appropriate Stadium has put our region well behind other Regional Victoria towns. Ballarat and Bendigo both have Indoor Stadiums with capacities of 3000 and 4000 respectively. There is a clear desire and requirement for Geelong to have a Stadium that matches or exceeds the capacity of these other regions considering the population size and projected growth.   

The future of Netball in our community is being severely hampered by the lack of facility infrastructure growth to meet the exponential growth in the Barwon Region

We look forward to supporting any progressive conversations surrounding Netball infrastructure enhancements in the future to benefit our community.