Victoria Brest Women

In 2006, Victoria made its first appearance in the Belarus Cup and finished sixth, last in the field. The entry came from a training centre rather than from a club with a long playing record. The team that now carries the name in the Belarusian women's top flight was founded in 2016, ten years later.

The centre itself is older. Construction of the complex in Brest began in 2003, and it opened on 31 August 2004. Its full title, Brest Regional Centre for Olympic Reserve for Ball Games "Victoria", named after Anatoly Petrovich Meshkov, says what it was built for: to train young players, with a first team attached.

The results reflect that order of priorities. In the Belarusian Premier League the team has usually finished in the lower half of the table, most recently in eighth place. The title race in this league has belonged to others: Horizont has 15 championships, Olimpia Grodno 9 and Tsmoki-Minsk 7. Victoria's own competition beyond the domestic league is at youth level, in FIBA Europe's under-16 events.

Anastasiya Babak has been the team's key player and top scorer. The hall on Leningradskaya Street has a ceiling-mounted LED cube with four screens over the central court, a feature few women's teams in the country can match.

The centre's work shows in a different set of figures from the league table. Twenty-eight of its graduates have been named to national team rosters, and another 44 play for clubs in Belarus and abroad.