In Victoria, at the Eastern Raptors Rugby League Club, you can see the glow of lights shining above the suburban rugby oval. You can hear the thuds of tackles and supporters and family members who ring the fences cheering on their side or child. Even ten years ago, scenes like this were rare. Even rarer in the state of Victoria.
Long time Melbourne Storm fan, Sheridan Gibson, remembers what it was like.
“Not even 15 years ago, superstars of the game could’ve walked down the street and not be recognised,” she tells upstart. “[That’s] something that would never happen to an AFL player.”
For more than a century, Australian Rules Football (AFL) has dominated the Victorian sporting landscape. The winter months have always meant packed footy stadiums, constant media attention and hundreds of local clubs state-wide making it, arguably, the most popular sport in Victoria. In 2025, the all-time AFL membership record was broken when 1,363,437 paid their dues to a club they love. Victorian clubs contributed 816,855 of those members. Besides cricket in the summer months, few sports have come close to challenging its dominance.
However, a quiet shift is starting to occur.
Rugby League, long considered a preferred code in the northern states, is gaining more traction in the south. Participation figures reflect this. NRL Victoria recorded more than 6,000 player registrations for the 2025 season, the highest number in the history of rugby league in the state. At the same time, the Melbourne Storm achieved its highest ever membership tally by surpassing 30,000 members. The question now being asked is whether this growth in popularity represents a genuine breakthrough in Victoria.
A driving factor behind the games growth has been the continued success of the Melbourne Storm in the National Rugby League (NRL). Having made a preliminary final in their first year, 1998, and winning the grand final a year later, success kept following the Melbourne Storm. Since 2000, the team has reached 11 grand finals and won six of them. The club has only failed to qualify for the finals three times.
Chendoah Smith, a referee and former coach at the Eastern Raptors Rugby League Club, believes the success of the Melbourne Storm has been incredibly important to the grassroots growth of the game in the state.
“The massive commercial growth of the NRL in recent years means that kids are seeing heroes with a Melbourne logo in grand final after grand final, ” Smith tells upstart. “Success equals household names and players that children look up to and want to be like.”
According to the NRL’s 2024 annual report, Victoria recorded 42,123 participants. This ranks it as the state with the third highest rugby league participation rate, behind only New South Wales and Queensland. Additionally, the state saw a 21 percent growth in registered club participation.
“Under 13’s, 15’s and 18’s and especially girls are showing the strongest growth in numbers,” Smith says.
Last year, the Melbourne Storm announced that it will field seven teams across the NRL, starting with an under 17’s team leading up to the senior side in the NRL. In the past, the team only had two feeder clubs, the Sunshine Coast Falcons in Queensland, and a Knock-on Effect Cup side in New South Wales. Fielding seven teams is a key milestone for juniors in Victoria, giving them a clearer pathway to the professional league.
“Being a young player from Victoria almost always meant you’d have to do a stint in New South Wales or Queensland,” Smith says. “Going up against players from those states for a shot seemed impossible. With the Storm academy and junior pathways now, this becomes a more achievable career.”
“I think there is a direct correlation between this and the growing grassroots population.”
Sheridan Gibson has witnessed the shift first-hand. She grew up around AFL as a Collingwood supporter. But a move up to Queensland opened her eyes to a different sporting code and she became a foundation member of the Melbourne Storm.
“I was at their first ever home game and will never forget the crowd that night,” she says. “The game was actually delayed for five minutes and people were sitting on the running track around Olympic Park after halftime because so many people wanted to watch the game.”
“Being a Collingwood supporter and going to Vic Park every week I was used to seeing big crowds, but seeing this in Victoria really blew my mind.”
Gibson has renewed her membership every year since then.
“I think today, more people in Melbourne are aware of the players and genuine success they have achieved,” she says. “It’s really good to see and it’s no surprise that the game is continuing to grow in the state.”
Record Storm memberships, strong home crowd numbers and rising junior participation numbers suggests that this is a surge, rather than just a small spike. The sea of purple scarves and jerseys at a Melbourne Storm home game cancels out the lime green coloured seats at AAMI Park, showing the sheer numbers.
“The Storm are managing to sell out multiple games a year, even with AFL on at the same time,” Smith says.
People in Victoria are not just showing their support for their home team, but also for the sport. The annual three game State of Origin Series between New South Wales and Queensland, arguably the biggest sporting rivalry in the country, attracted over 90,000 fans to the MCG in 2024. This crowd was the biggest of all the games in the 2024 series, with Melbourne having 13,000 more fans than Sydney did and almost double that of Brisbane.
“That is absolutely monumental growth in an AFL city,” Smith says.
“I know the Storm being the only Victorian team is a factor here, but in my opinion, NRL absolutely has the potential to be Victoria’s second biggest sport.”
Article: Harrison Smith is a third-year Media and Communications (Sports Media major) student at La Trobe University. You can follow him on X at @HarrySmith1909.
Cover photo: Melbourne Storm vs Dolphins, NRL 2024 Round 25 at AAMI Park By EdwardJT found HERE and used under a creative commons license. This image has not been modified.
