A team of seven rugby players from the Manly Warringah Sea Eagles, Australia’s National Rugby League (NRL) team, refused to wear a jersey with ‘Pride’ inscription (‘pride’) in support of the LGBTQIA+ community. local, in a game of the respective league, for not having been consulted on the decision of «inclusion through sport» taken by the club from Oceania without the athletes giving their opinion to the idea of the direction
The unusual and unexpected decision was confirmed at a press conference held on Monday (early Tuesday morning in mainland Portugal) the team’s coach, Des Hasler [foto de capa]who publicly apologized “to the community whose rights were intended to be supported with the unprecedented initiative” but acknowledging: “The club made a big mistake”.
That lapse, said a coach overwhelmed by the negative outcome of what he intended to be a good deed, was “not having consulted the players before coming up with the idea”. For this reason, Hasler also apologized “to the athletes involved”.
The heptet’s identity was kept by the club in the secret of the gods, but according to the Sydney Daily Telegraph, the seven players who refused to wear the jersey – and as the NRL does not allow the same team to play in different jerseys (or different inscriptions, front or back, as would be the case), made the idea unfeasible from birth – they will be Josh Aloiai, Jason Saab, Christian Tuipulotu, Josh Schuster, Haumole Olakau’atu, Tolu Koula and Toafofoa Sipley.
«What infuriates me the most is that they don’t get angry and indignant about cases, for example, of domestic violence, but now they are opposed by religious and cultural issues, which, I reinforce, I respect the most. But this mess resulted in a mess”, summarized a coach who will even face the Illawarra Kawks, in the next match, without any mention of the human rights of LGBTQIA+ on the shirts, after all, with all the controversy that the episode triggered.
So much so that even the Australian Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, has also gone public to appease the mood. “It is important that in Australian society everyone respects everyone for being what they are and how they are, regardless of the rest”, said the Executive leader about the episode, whose echoes end up having the opposite effect to what was intended.
“What this served was to show that homophobia and discrimination are still very much present in Australia and in sport”, summarized Ian Roberts to the Australian daily – the former and biggest star in the history of the Manly Warringah Sea Eagles is homosexual. “We made a significant mistake”, assumed the club, in a statement.
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