Allanah Bruno first female goal umpire to officiate in SANFL league game

THE SANFL has already created history with the first female field umpire officiating in a league game. Now a female has entered the league goal umpiring ranks.

Goal umpire Allanah Bruno will make her league debut on Saturday. Picture: Tait Schmaal.

TEENAGER Allanah Bruno will create history as the first female goal umpire to officiate in an SANFL league game when she waves the flags in the clash between West Adelaide and Sturt at Richmond Oval on Saturday.

Five years after taking up umpiring, Bruno will follow field umpire Eleni Glouftsis as only the second female to officiate in an SANFL league game.

“I’ve been waiting for this opportunity for a while so it should be good fun,” Bruno, 19, said. “I’m pretty excited, but come game day I’ll probably have some nerves.

“I have just got to think of it as another game.”

Watching in the crowd will be AFL goal umpire Steven Axon, her mentor and the biggest influence on her career.

Bruno never seriously followed a team, preferring to watch the umpires do their stuff knowing that was the direction she wanted to take in the sport. Her dad Mario is a field umpire with the amateurs, while brother Michael is also a goal umpire.

In fact, Michael will officiate in the reserves game before Allanah makes her league debut.

In 2013, she started umpiring in under 16 games as a student at Salisbury High, then graduated to the under 18s, before standing behind the goals in reserves games and the AFLW.

When she first started, there were the 90-minute train and bus trips to West Lakes twice a week for training when there would be just one other female there. Now there are four doing the boundary and five behind the goals.

There would be those fun times at school when her fellow students, many playing in teams at games she was involved in, would pretend to wave the flags to signal a goal.

She found it funny, loved it.

“Steven Axon was the big SANFL umpire I watched growing up,” Bruno said. “In the past year he has told me to focus on speed and agility, being fast and getting into position quickly. The elements I’ve been good at are ready the play and composure.

“Being a female is no obstacle these days, it is a very inclusive environment and I’ve never felt I could not do it.”

Every now and again Bruno has been on the end of a negative comment from the crowd. But her tremendous attitude means they are deflected without issue.

“You are only human and the comment is not at you, it is at the decision,” she said.