AAA<\/p>\n
It\u2019s 5pm on a Thursday, and excited kids are tumbling out of cars queuing outside a basketball stadium in Melbourne\u2019s west.<\/p>\n
They hurry inside after their parents drop them off, snaking past a rotten outdoor deck, a big red-lettered \u201creception\u201d stand \u2013 a relic of the \u201990s \u2013 and grimy bathrooms (the men\u2019s, tonight, is splattered with fresh blood).<\/p>\n
Glass doors open directly onto the slippery gymnasium floor, while parents sit on a steep, perilous grandstand and long metal benches. This is the west\u2019s \u201cshow court\u201d at RecWest Braybrook \u2013 and these kids are the lucky ones, the Westgate Basketball Association says.<\/p>\n
They haven\u2019t been turned away, or relegated to long wait lists that others endure.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe single biggest frustration and cap on our participation is facilities,\u201d association vice president Llewellyn Rees says. \u201cTraining schedules are cooked, playing schedules are all the way into the night.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/8e5cc6fbfddf109c26071ed0b0c965d157a630fc.jpeg\")
The battle for a new stadium in Maribyrnong is heating up, with Westgate Basketball Association members (pictured) demanding budget action from the local council.Jason South<\/p>\n
President Glenn Casement gestures up at a piece of plywood plugging a crack in the stadium wall. \u201cOur kids deserve a better experience at their home stadium.\u201d<\/p>\n
The long-winded and fraught battle for a new stadium in Melbourne\u2019s west is expected to escalate on Monday night, when the association demands Maribyrnong Council \u201cput their money where their mouth is\u201d and commit to funding the project at a meeting about the council\u2019s draft budget.<\/p>\n
For three years the council has backed the plan for a new six-court indoor sports stadium at Yarraville as part of $60 million upgrades to McIvor Reserve<\/a>.<\/p>\n But the association says it is out of patience and time, and only a formal budget commitment, contingent on state and federal funding, and setting aside money, will do.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ve been waiting for all the goodwill and promises to crystallise,\u201d Rees says.<\/p>\n Maribyrnong Council has committed $2.5 million to designing the stadium, and is lobbying the Victorian and federal governments to build it at McIvor Reserve as a priority. A submission co-signed by Labor MPs Katie Hall and Melissa Horne was shot down in the recent state budget.<\/p>\n \u201cWe recognise there is a chronic shortage of indoor sporting facilities across Melbourne\u2019s inner west, which is placing significant pressure on community access, participation and local sporting clubs,\u201d Maribyrnong Mayor Mohamed Semra said.<\/p>\n \u201cHowever, we can\u2019t meet demand for the stadium alone.\u201d<\/p>\n Maribyrnong needs up to another 12 courts to satisfy local demand, according to a 2018 council-commissioned report<\/a>. But the association claims it would immediately outgrow that dozen, with more than 200 players on wait lists, and hundreds more waiting in the wings.<\/p>\n![\"Westgate](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/78c364f93fdb0c060194fa1e4b02ed9e4f31e38b.jpeg\")
Westgate Basketball Association president Glenn Casement (left) and vice president Llewellyn Rees. Jason South<\/p>\n