| National Sports Museum | |
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Outside National Sports Museum at the Melbourne Cricket Ground |
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| Established | 22 November 1986 As the Australian Gallery of Sport and Olympic Museum 13 March 2008 As the National Sports Museum |
| Dissolved | 4 October 2003 As the Australian Gallery of Sport and Olympic Museum |
| Location | Melbourne, Australia |
| Type | Sporting museum |
| Website | http://www.nsm.org.au/ |
The National Sports Museum is a museum dedicated to Australian sport and is located within the Melbourne Cricket Ground in Melbourne, Australia. It features exhibitions and galleries of items related mainly to Australian Rules Football, Cricket, the Summer and Winter Olympic Games, the Sport Australia Hall of Fame and the Melbourne Cricket Ground itself. Other sports also featured include Tennis, Rugby League, Rugby Union, Golf, Soccer, Basketball and Netball. The museum has been criticised for a parochial focus on Australian rules football, the most popular code in the four southern of Australia's six states, to the exclusion of sports such as rugby league and rugby union which are more popular within the other two Australian states.[1]
The adjoining MCC Museum features exhibitions relating to the history of the Melbourne Cricket Club. On 6 October 2010, the Australian Racing Museum was absorbed into the National Sports Museum, which has now resulted in Horse Racing standing alongside other prominent Australian sports.
Before the National Sports Museum opened, the Australian Gallery of Sport and Olympic Museum operated for 17 years before it closed. The museum was located in front of the former MCC Members Stand which opened in 1928, which was demolished at the same time as the museum. It initially opened on 22 November 1986 before closing to the public on 4 October 2003. More than 35,000 went through the museum in its final week in operation, when it was opened to the public for free in conjunction with access to the former MCC Members Pavilion.
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