Jul 5

Jul 5 Melwood: Liverpool FC Women's Training Ground - Nurturing Success on and off the Pitch

Melwood: A Positive Transformation for Women’s Football

Melwood is a name synonymous with English football. As the former training base of Liverpool FC, it ranks alongside names like Carrington, Hotspur Way and Etihad Campus as epicentres of training excellence.

However, it must be said that most of these training grounds are not commonly associated with womens football, and it is an indictment on the sport as a whole that women’s teams are often found training in parks or leisure centres, and not in a dedicated facility.

This is where Melwood stands alone, as it is now home to the Liverpool FC Women’s team, and unprecedented move by Liverpool in a time when the women’s game is going through explosive growth.

An Overview of Melwood

Melwood, located in West Derby, Liverpool, is the training ground and academy for Liverpool Football Club's Women's first team, youth teams, and academy.

It was formerly the men's first team's training ground from the 1950s until November 2020. The facility was bought by affordable housing development company Torus in 2019, but was repurchased by the club in June 2023, with the specific purpose of becoming the training base for Liverpool FC women’s teams.

Melwood’s History

Early Years

The Melwood ground previously belonged to St Francis Xavier, a local school. The facility was named after two priests, Father Melling and Father Woodlock, who taught football at the school's playing fields.

Liverpool's Tenure

Liverpool moved into the facility in the 1950s, after previously training at Anfield on the pitch, which wasn’t doing the surface any favours.

The training base had significantly deteriorated by the end of the decade.

When now legendary manager Bill Shankly arrived in 1959, he and his staff transformed Melwood into a top-class training facility. It has gone down in English football folklore as a place that has produced some of the best sides to play the game, with some of the greatest players to match.

Millennium Pavilion

In January 2001, Liverpool started work on the Millennium Pavilion, a modern facility for players and coaches, designed in part and heavily influenced by then-manager Gérard Houllier.

When Liverpool won the UEFA Champions League for the fifth time in 2005, Rafael Benítez found a new home for the famous trophy, a glass case in the main entrance.

Final Upgrade

The final upgrade came during Brendan Rodgers' time as manager.

Upgrades were made to the changing rooms and a new main entrance was added which housed a bust of Shankly's head next to his famous 'We Are Liverpool' quote.

Redevelopment

Move to Kirkby

In 1998, youth and development teams had been moved to a new 56-acre integrated training facility at The Academy in Kirkby.

In 2017, LFC revealed a plan of a proposed redevelopment of the Kirkby centre at a cost of £50 million, allowing the first team to move training to the expanded facility.

Repurchase of Melwood and a New Purpose

On May 31, 2023, it was reported that Liverpool had initiated conversations to buy back Melwood, as the housing project had fallen through. The proposal was for Melwood to be repurposed as a dedicated training centre for the Liverpool women’s team.

On May 8, 2023, Liverpool Football Club officially announced that it had re-purchased the iconic landmark to once again serve as a dedicated training base as it had done for 70 years.

This time it would be home to Liverpool Women's First Team. The club also announced it would be home to Liverpool Women's academy and youth teams after being awarded a Category 1 Professional Game Academy (PGA) licence by the Football Association.

Liverpool FC's managing director, Andy Hughes, said: "This is a truly historic moment for Liverpool Football Club and the continued desire of the LFC Women board to elevate and develop our women's first team and Category 1 Professional Game Academy.
"Now is the right time to make this move and we're absolutely delighted that we've managed to take this opportunity to return to Melwood and to see it start a new chapter of Liverpool's commitment to our women's first team and academy.
"We also have an opportunity to further develop the use of the site to support the local community by using it as an additional base for LFC Foundation. We are delighted that FEFA will continue to use the site for its college that provides sport and educational opportunities for young people.

Making a Statement for Women’s Football

As part of the move to Melwood, there is something more even more symbolic at stake.

The women’s team will adopt the club crest of Liverpool Football Club, dropping their own crest to make them an intrinsic part of the club going forward.

This may seem nothing more than a branding token, but it finally absorbs the women’s team fully into the fabric of the club, from a once a separate entity, to a vital part of the Liverpool puzzle going forward.

This significant move, by one of England’s most prominent clubs, puts women’s football further towards front of mind in our social conscious.

The success of England’s lionesses in the 2022 Euro’s has grown the game in stature in the UK, and alongside other giant clubs like FC Barcelona, Lyon et al, Liverpool are making great strides in the women’s game.