In the early hours of April 16, Glen Waverley Soccer Club was rocked by a suspected arson attack that devastated its home base at Capital Reserve in Glen Waverley.
The blaze tore through the club’s facilities, destroying essential equipment, uniforms for more than 300 junior players, irreplaceable memorabilia, and administrative supplies which left a shock for the entire community beyond the major physical damage caused by the incident.
For a club that has stood as a cornerstone of the local area for more than 45 years, this was a heartbreaking blow.
Soon after, however, an outpouring of support from the local community rose like a phoenix from the ashes.
With a GoFundMe campaign now surpassing $20,000 and donations coming in from individuals, manufacturers, and fellow clubs alike, Glen Waverley SC has begun the slow journey towards recovery.
Soccerscene spoke with club treasurer and senior player Yianni Ganotis who has been part of the club since he was seven years old. He discussed the impact of the fire, the overwhelming community response, and what lies ahead for one of Victoria’s most cherished grassroots football clubs.
Theo Athans
How long have you personally been involved in Glen Waverley SC both as player and as part of the board?
Yianni Ganotis
Started playing for the club at seven years old and played every year until I turned 20 when I then moved into the seniors and started playing more competitive state league football for the club.
I’m 29 now so when I was 23 or 24, I took on the treasurer role to help them out just as a volunteer of course, try to help out with the books and whatever else I could do really. It’s a little bit of a hybrid role between player and treasurer at the moment.
T.A.
The GoFundMe for the fire was setup in April, how much money has been donated at the club and how has the support been from the local community?
Y.G.
We really got a lot of support behind it that I didn’t really expect to receive so that’s been amazing from friends and families.
We just hit $20,000 in about the six week mark and it’s absolutely amazing that through social media and word of mouth that everyone is spreading the word on their own platforms. Other soccer clubs in the community have been great as well with trying to get behind us and help us in any way they can.
No one owed us anything but they’ve all given us a helping hand and contributed to the $20,000 that we raised on the GoFundMe so really proud of that.
I set it up and posted on my socials on behalf of the club because I didn’t want to make it seem like the club itself was asking for the funds so just overall really stoked about where it’s all come to.
T.A.
It said on the fundraiser that the club needed training and matchday equipment, uniforms, and Venue Hire so in those two months, how much progress has been made?
Y.G.
So pretty much in the fire we lost all our equipment and we had just received the kits a couple of days beforehand as well so for 300 juniors with one or two kits between them all, you can imagine how many that is, so they got lost and it hurt.
The money is pretty much all going to go towards kits, equipment and trying to get the kids on the park to give them what they expected to have two months ago now.
However on top of the $20,000, people have been kind enough to donate to us like producers and manufacturers have sent us what they can to help out like balls, cones and bibs.
You don’t see that on the GoFundMe so that’s all added up but certainly that’s where the money will likely go as well to try and support the 300 kids that we’ve got at the club.
T.A.
Do you have any update on the progression of the recovery at Capital Reserve?
Y.G.
The insurance are building up an assessment for the council at the moment so they’re just assessing what it will look like moving forward. I think the plan is that in a year’s time they will be able to rebuild and restructure the whole venue and certainly will be working closely with us and the other tenants the ground accommodates for.
There’s a little bit of a wait ahead of us now but the council has been really accommodating in at least trying to make it beneficial for what we’re going to actually need while we’re at it so I think it’ll start next year but probably be a two year development I imagine but nothing is set.
T.A.
The fire was treated as suspicious and it happened close to 4am so do you have any information about the way the incident occurred?
Y.G.
I don’t have any information to be honest; it’s still an active police case now.
What is interesting is that Capital Reserve got hit on the 16th of April early in the morning and a couple of weeks later the Waverley Wanderers field had a very similar incident and I remember that being a Saturday or Sunday morning.
There’s no further update but I’ve had to work closely with the Police, gone into their Oakleigh station to leave a statement, there’s been a relative involvement about a party so any information I could give them about that and then another follow up with them recently but that’s about it.
As far as I know right now, it’s active with them and they’ll reach out if they need anything more from me or anyone else that can help them.
T.A.
You mentioned Waverley Wanderers, this seems to be happening at other clubs in the South East, have you talked to other clubs about this string of incidents?
Y.G.
Yeah, Waverley Wanderers are obviously alert of it being a close demographic club to us as well and basically the same thing happened to their club so we had some talks with them about any kind of suspicion or alerts.
There was some relation to Monash City Villarreal as well last year where the President had his personal car targeted in an attack so I don’t know if they’re all linked, attached or a coincidence like their own individual scenarios but I certainly wouldn’t know anything more.
