MELBOURNE, Australia — Few outside of Australia have heard of Mandurah or Bunbury, and they’re not exactly the most heralded of places among Australians. But it was here where the latest chapter of Juan Mata’s career began. A journey that had taken the 37-year-old to winning a World Cup with Spain, the Champions League with Chelsea, and an FA Cup with Manchester United had now arrived at a training camp with his new side, Melbourne Victory, in two small towns on the West Australian coast.
The veteran had only been back in Australia for a few days at that point, flying in to sign with Victory after his contract with the Western Sydney Wanderers concluded after the 2024-25 A-League Men season. And that process had been a marathon itself, too: the Spaniard jetting from Europe to San Diego, where he’s part of the ownership of MLS outfit San Diego FC, before flying across the Pacific. Heading straight from the airport to AAMI Park to sign his contract before being presented to media at Federation Square.
But here he was, making the four-hour flight — roughly equivalent to London to Moscow — to join his new side’s preseason.
“It was tough for travel reasons, but it was good for me to get into the team and dressing room and to get to know everyone better,” Mata told ESPN. “I think when you do a short camp like that, when you spend time with all the people that went from the club, you get to know each other better.”
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There would be no private suite for the marquee man, either; rooming with Socceroos defender Jason Davidson, a reunion of when the two faced off in the group stages of the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, where Davidson started and Mata came on as a substitute in a 3-0 win to Spain.
“We actually did [talk about the World Cup],” Davidson told ESPN. “We looked at some photos as well; it was funny. We watched the clips of the highlights of the game and there we are next to each other, a bit younger in the face both of us.
“Funny enough, in England, when he was at United and when I was [at West Bromwich Albion], I was on the bench [when] we actually beat them at Old Trafford. We were having a laugh about that as well.”
Set to get his first taste of a Melbourne Derby on Saturday when Victory face crosstown foes Melbourne City, Mata has built into the new A-League season. Coming off the bench in the first two rounds, he made his first start in a trip to face Perth Glory over the weekend, playing in his preferred No. 10 role and netting a first goal in his new colors. Victory kitman Johnny Nguyen helped warm him before that game, and, after being surprised by his “tekkers,” as other members of the Victory staff put it, it’s looking like that might be the start of Mata’s new warm-up ritual.
Mata makes his mark
Victory double their advantage through Juan Mata, as the new signing notches a goal in his first start for @gomvfc
Watch #PERvMVC live on Paramount+ pic.twitter.com/2s95rLFLAe
— Paramount+ Australia (@ParamountPlusAU) October 31, 2025
The former Premier League star has earned praise from Victory boss Arthur Diles, who noted that Mata wasn’t initially expected to be ready for round one when he first arrived, only to put in the work to be available.
“There are not many games in Australia,” Mata laughed (the A-League Men regular season lasts 26 games). “And I wanted to be ready as soon as I could.”
Looking back, that Mata signed with Victory at all caught some off guard. Not so much because players of his standard are alien to the A-League Men — the competition has a history of famous, if aging, marquees such as Dwight Yorke, Alessandro Del Piero, and Luis Nani — but because he arrived having already spent one, not all that fruitful, season at Western Sydney.
Arriving with much fanfare, the veteran logged just 599 cumulative minutes in 2024-25 and was relegated to a bench role by Wanderers coach Alen Stajcic by the time the finals rolled out. This lack of game-time invariably became a major talking point, with Mata’s Australian-based representative, Fahid Ben Khalfallah, labelling the Sydney club “disrespectful,” in comments that Stajcic then called “out of order” and “cowardly.”
Having initially been offered to Sydney FC, according to then-Sky Blue chief executive Mark Aubrey, it never looked like Stajcic and Mata clicked. Thus, when his contract ended, following the Wanderers’ first-round playoff exit against Victory, an unfruitful time in Australia looked at his end.
Given that he’d spent years logging sporadic minutes at Galatasaray, Vissel Kobe, and then the Wanderers, since leaving Manchester, to say nothing of his age and his move into the world of sports ownership, few would have been surprised if Mata had opted to hang up his boots at that point. Looking at its trophy cabinet, he’s one of those few players you could say have come close to “completing” football, too.
But, speaking to ESPN, the Spaniard made clear that wasn’t going to happen. He felt good; he enjoyed living in Australia; and, most importantly, he still loved playing the game.
“I wanted to keep showing that I can still enjoy my football and provide a good level,” he said. “That’s what it was in my mind. I didn’t want to finish in that way, not playing a lot and losing in the finals.
“The passion for the game, I still had it. Because at the end of the day, and this is something that we learn as players in our careers, sometimes decisions will be made, and you cannot do anything about it. You can only control your behavior, your attitude, and your love for the game.
“That’s on me, that’s not on other people. That’s something that I actually tell the younger players: do not let other people affect your love for the game. And that’s what I tried not to do.”
That love of the game. The joy that comes with kicking a ball around and a love for the sport that was fostered when he watched his father, Juan Manuel Mata, playing for Burgos CF; they’re the same feelings that have kept the younger Mata coming back.
Football, he reflects, has taken him to some of the grandest stages an athlete can experience. And now, while the stage might not be the same as Stamford Bridge or Old Trafford, they’ve also given him the chance to experience life in Turkey, Japan, Sydney, and now Melbourne. At his first meeting with the Melbourne media, for instance, he sought advice on the best shops to experience his new home’s famous coffee culture, which he followed up on this week.
“[Australia] is a country that offers you so much in terms of nature and a relaxed lifestyle,” he said. “For that time in my life and in my career, I thought it was a good match. I’m still thinking if I am interested in any other countries for the future, but nothing comes to mind.”
And these new clubs, be they a Wanderers or a Victory, in a land wherein football isn’t the premier sport, and the spotlight is just a little less harsh, carry their own level of appeal.
“It’s different. Because for some time during your career, that passion, and I will say that enjoyment, tends to fade when the expectations and the responsibility are bigger and you play for big clubs and you need to perform,” he explains. “That feeling of enjoyment can be a bit compromised.
“But I always try to tell myself, I started to play football because I wanted it, because I loved it and because I enjoyed it. And so I always try to come back to that feeling of when I was a kid and I saw my dad playing football.
“That’s why I’m still playing football. That’s purely because of that. It’s because of the enjoyment of the game. When I’m training or when I’m in a game with the ball at my feet, I still feel that enjoyment.”
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