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TX Football Forges a Deal with Springvale White Eagles FC
The agreement follows an extensive evaluation process focused on design capability, communication efficiency and service delivery, all key factors in supporting the club’s on and off-field operations. Emphasising collaboration and responsiveness, the collaboration is expected to streamline the kit development process while delivering high-quality apparel aligned with the club’s identity.
Springvale White Eagles FC Secretary, Drazen Ninkovic highlighted Tradexco’s design capability, efficiency and collaborative approach as key drivers behind the agreement.
“Springvale White Eagles FC selected Tradexco (TX) as our clothing sponsor for the 2026 season due to their innovative approach to kit and apparel design and their highly efficient communication process. The absence of intermediaries allowed for direct collaboration, ensuring prompt correspondence and the seamless translation of the club’s ideas into final designs approved for production without delay,” he said via press release.
“The level of customer service provided by the Tradexco team has been exceptional, and we look forward to this partnership developing into a strong, long-term collaboration.”
Supplied by TX Football
Tradexco Founder and CEO, Shah Ali Rajput highlighted the milestone nature of the agreement and the brand’s commitment to delivering value, quality and long-term support at the VPL level.
“We are extremely proud to be working with a VPL club of Springvale White Eagles’ calibre. As our first men’s VPL competition club, this partnership is a significant milestone for us. From day one, our focus has been clear — delivering high-quality teamwear, on time, and at genuine value for the club,” he said via press release.
“This partnership allows us, as a local Victorian brand, to showcase to the VPL league the level of quality, professionalism, and reliability that exists within the local football ecosystem. We will be going above and beyond to deliver the very best on-field and off-field products, supporting Springvale White Eagles at every level and contributing to their continued success.”
This agreement supports Tradexco’s continued commercial expansion, reinforcing its credibility as a high-performance apparel supplier and enhancing its ability to service clubs operating at the highest state-league standards.
Sydney FC is looking to turn its existing corporate relationships into a broader business development platform with the launch of The Collective, a new membership network built around connections between businesses.
The initiative, launched ahead of the 2026/27 A-League season, will combine corporate events, matchday experiences and behind-the-scenes access with opportunities for members to engage directly with Sydney FC’s wider commercial network.
Rather than positioning the offering solely around hospitality, the club is placing business development at the centre of the proposition. Members identify the organisations and individuals they want to connect with, and Sydney FC and The Collective work together to facilitate those introductions
Sydney FC Executive Vice Chairman Sebastian Gray said the club’s already diverse corporate network will only benefit from this initiative.
“Football is a fantastic vehicle for bringing people together, but we want The Collective to go beyond matchday,” Gray said. “It will be about creating connections, opening doors and providing experiences that our members genuinely value throughout the year.”
The club has partnered with Andrew Towner, founder of The Corporate Collective, to develop the network. Towner has previously built a business community around the NRL and will bring that experience into the Sydney FC platform.
The Collective will be offered through Premium and Standard membership packages, giving businesses different levels of access to events, experiences and the club’s corporate network.
For Sydney FC, the model adds another layer to its commercial partnership strategy, moving beyond individual sponsorship assets to create a recurring platform for B2B engagement.
It also gives the club another way to demonstrate commercial value to its business partners, with networking and potential new business opportunities becoming part of the proposition alongside traditional brand exposure and hospitality.
South Melbourne versus Melbourne Victory is more than a long-awaited rivalry. It is an opportunity to unite Australian football around its history – and its future.
On 10 October, South Melbourne FC and Melbourne Victory will walk onto AAMI Park for an Australia Cup Final that represents far more than a trophy.
It brings together two proud clubs from different chapters of Australian football’s history.
One is among the most successful clubs of the former National Soccer League era. The other has become one of the defining clubs of the A-League era.
The atmosphere will be extraordinary. The rivalry will be genuine. The football will be fiercely contested.
Such is the anticipation surrounding the match that it also has genuine potential to break the modern Australia Cup Final attendance record of 18,751, set at the same venue in 2016.
That would represent much more than a number on a crowd sheet. A record attendance would send a powerful message about the public appetite for meaningful fixtures, authentic rivalries and competitions that connect every level of Australian football.
But this final can – and should – mean even more.
It presents Australian football with an opportunity to bring its past, present and future together.
It is an opportunity to dismantle the tired and damaging distinction between “old soccer” and “new football”.
Most importantly, it can demonstrate what becomes possible when the entire game is connected.
We Cannot Build the Future by Discarding the Past
Australian football needed reform at the beginning of this century.
The game required stronger governance, greater professionalism, better commercial structures and a national competition capable of reaching new audiences.
The establishment of the A-League in 2005 opened an important new chapter. It created clubs, rivalries and major occasions that have contributed enormously to the development of the professional game.
But somewhere during that transformation, the idea took hold that Australian football could only move forward by separating itself from much of what had come before it.
The labels “old soccer” and “new football” became a fault line.
Too many clubs, supporters, volunteers and communities that had carried the game for decades were made to feel that their history was no longer welcome at the top table.
In creating something new, the game sometimes appeared determined to dispense with everything associated with its past.
That included the clubs and development pathways that identified, nurtured and produced many members of Australia’s Golden Generation.
Australian football should never be embarrassed by that history.
It is one of our game’s greatest competitive advantages.
Traditional clubs were built by migrant communities that brought their passion, culture and football knowledge to Australia.
They established clubs, built grounds, developed players, created lifelong supporters and sustained the game when it received little mainstream attention or investment.
These communities did not merely support Australian football.
They built it.
Recognising that contribution does not require us to reject the progress made during the A-League era. Both can be true.
The game needed to evolve, but it did not need to marginalise its foundations to do so.
This Is Not “Old” Against “New”
It would be easy to promote South Melbourne against Melbourne Victory as “old soccer” meeting “new football”.
It might create a convenient headline, but it would miss the greater significance of the occasion – and perpetuate a division the game must leave behind.
South Melbourne is not a relic from Australian football’s past.
It is a living and ambitious club with generations of supporters, a distinguished record of national success and an enduring role in developing players and representing its community.
Melbourne Victory is not separate from Australian football’s history.
It is another important chapter in it – a club that has built an enormous following, delivered some of the country’s most memorable sporting occasions and demonstrated the scale that professional football can achieve in Australia.
These clubs were created in different eras, but they belong to the same game.
The future of Australian football is neither “old” nor “new”.
It is one football.
Supporters Want a Connected Game
This final arrives at a time when the appetite for a properly connected football pyramid is becoming impossible to ignore.
Supporters want clubs to have something meaningful to aspire to.
They want success on the field to create opportunity.
They want to see a genuine connection between grassroots football, state competitions, traditional clubs, national competitions and the professional game.
A connected pyramid is about more than promotion and relegation.
It is about unlocking aspiration, investment, relevance and growth throughout the sport.
When clubs can see a pathway forward, they invest in facilities, coaching, academies, commercial capability and community engagement.
When supporters believe their club’s journey can lead somewhere, they become more deeply invested.
When local rivalries carry national consequences, new audiences, media attention and commercial partners follow.
That energy already exists throughout Australian football.
Our opportunity is to harness it.
The Platforms Are Demonstrating What Is Possible
The Australia Cup has repeatedly shown what can happen when clubs from every level are given the opportunity to compete on a national stage.
It connects the grassroots and professional game. It creates genuine jeopardy. It brings national attention to clubs, grounds and communities that rarely receive that level of exposure.
It also produces compelling stories that cannot be manufactured through marketing alone.
The Australian Championship represents another important step. It gives some of the country’s most historic and ambitious clubs a new national platform and creates a stronger bridge between state-based football and the professional game.
Neither competition should be viewed in isolation.
Together, the Australia Cup and Australian Championship can help reconnect the game, restore national relevance to important clubs and build momentum towards a more integrated competition structure.
They also demonstrate something commercially significant.
These communities are not simply part of football’s history. They are active audiences with passion, identity, purchasing power and an enduring commitment to their clubs.
When those communities are respected and properly engaged, they respond.
That creates value for broadcasters, commercial partners, governments and the wider professional game.
A Perspective Spanning Different Eras
My perspective has been shaped by experiencing Australian football across different clubs, competitions and eras.
I served as CEO of South Melbourne Soccer Club during one of the most successful periods in its history.
After leaving in 1997, I returned 12 months later for the 1998/99 season, when South secured its second consecutive national championship under Ange Postecoglou.
Nearly two decades later, in 2015, I returned to the professional game as CEO of Perth Glory in the A-League.
I subsequently joined Football Australia as a senior executive, where I played a key role in strengthening the Australia Cup as a national platform and developing the Australian Championship.
That journey has reinforced my belief that Australian football’s future will not be secured by choosing one part of its history over another. It will be secured by bringing the best of every era together.
The game will fulfil its potential when it connects its professional clubs, traditional clubs, grassroots participants, diverse communities and national teams within a coherent and ambitious system.
This is not about returning to the past.
It is about carrying the best of our history into a stronger future.
South Melbourne Soccer Club newsletter, 1997. After stepping down as CEO, Peter Filopoulos returned 12 months later for the club’s 1998/99 national championship season.
More Than a Final
On 10 October, AAMI Park – the spiritual home of football in Melbourne—should become the stage for more than an Australia Cup Final.
It should be a celebration of the people and communities that built the game, the progress achieved during the professional era and the possibilities presented by a connected future.
South Melbourne supporters should be proud of what their club has contributed to Australian football and excited about what may lie ahead.
Melbourne Victory supporters should celebrate what their club has built and the role it continues to play in growing the professional game.
Every Australian football supporter should be able to look at this occasion and see something bigger than a contest between two clubs or two eras.
This final is not “old soccer” against “new football”.
It is Australian football – proud of its entire history, united around its future and ready to unlock its true potential.
