Caulfield told to seal Dees deal on racecourse relocation

Kysaiah Pickett jumps over the fence of Gosch’s Paddock to fetch an errant ball that has spilled out towards the morning stream of traffic.

The oval is one of the temporary homes the Melbourne Football Club divides its time between. Its administration and football departments are spread across AAMI Park, the MCG and Casey Fields.

It is a makeshift setup. Equipment is pulled out of a truck backed up as close as it can get to the fence, and there are issues with the remote Wi-Fi system staff are trying to set up.

While the players run drills, the minds of their bosses are 11 kilometres away – at Caulfield Racecourse, where a dream for a unified club precinct has been taking shape.

First floated in 2023, the site is the club’s top preference to become the permanent home of its men’s and women’s AFL and VFL programs. Preliminary designs feature an indoor training centre, event space and three multi-use fields.

Demons fans would be forgiven for thinking the project had petered out. There have been minimal updates since an early-stage feasibility study was published in 2024.

But behind the scenes, it has been an almost constant fixation for club officials, particularly vice-president Geoff Porz. With a sizeable funding gap and the racecourse sitting on crown land, securing state government support was a top priority.

Demons supporter Jamie Bunn, a long-time acquaintance of Steve Dimopoulos, said he helped get the club in the room with the minister last year, who at the time held both sports and environment portfolios.

The club also sought advice from external consultants FMRS – run by a group of advisers who were in the inner sanctum of former premier Daniel Andrews.

The appointment of well-connected businessman Paul Guerra as chief executive – announced days after the club met Dimopoulos – appeared to be yet another strategy to get a foot in the door.

Guerra sits on the board of Racing Victoria and at the time headed up the Victorian Chamber of Commerce, theoretically making him well positioned to get the Caulfield deal over the line. A source inside the club, speaking anonymously to detail internal conversations, said he had made it known that he had strong working relationships on Spring Street.

But less than a year later, the chief executive was shown the door, having not formally met Dimopoulos or replacement environment minister Enver Erdogan once, according to ministerial diary disclosures.

In fact, the first time Erdogan – the responsible minister for the Caulfield Racecourse Reserve Trust – met the club after taking over the portfolio was