Dented pride: The reality for gay AFL footballers and why the men’s game is stuck in a vortex

A former male AFL player’s lengths to escape the limelight in order to come out as gay is indicative of an unsafe culture that still exists.

Gillon McLachlan. Picture: Getty Images

There are three high-profile AFL male footballers who may have retreated further into the closet after comments by AFL chief executive Gillon McLachlan.

That’s not McLachlan’s fault, nor his intention.

But it’s a sad reality when one of the most complex and sensitive issues circling the game finds itself in the headlines again.

Speaking at a lunch in Perth this week, the AFL boss said the “pressure and weight” of being the first AFL player to publicly come out is still too great.

“Being the first AFL player who comes out and plays as an out gay man, I think that weight, frankly I can understand why they would choose not to have to carry that burden around forever,” McLachlan said.

That “burden” is the problem facing the game and frustratingly it shows no sign of easing.

In the past 18 months, one male A-League player and one NBL basketballer have come out.

While AFLW players are proudly expressing their sexuality, the men’s game is stuck in a vortex.

“My view is that all the talk is the problem,” one industry source, who is gay, said this week.

“If no one talked about it everyone would just go, ‘Whatever just come out and move on’. But because of having the CEO stand up saying why gay people aren’t coming out, that’s why, because you are making it a big deal.

“Gay men and women want life to be normal, they don’t want to be singled out and the second you kind of do that sort of stuff it actually, in my view, makes it harder for people to come out because they look like they are different.

“Rather than all this pressure of being first, Gill should have said if people want to come out no one really cares. It was almost again shoving people back into the closet even though that was clearly not his intention.”

Even writing about this subject is regarded by some as a witch hunt, fuelling the trolls’ desperation to know the identity of the AFL’s gay footballers.

But the issue does need to be addressed and better handled.

Gillon McLachlan commented on the issues facing gay AFL players. Picture: Chris Kidd

These sentiments are shared by Angie Greene, the daughter of former Hawthorn champion Russell, who is the chief executive of Stand Up Events, a not-for-profit incorporated association dedicated to fighting homophobia, particularly in sport.

She has spoken to a number of gay AFL footballers and described McLachlan’s comments as “below average”.

“There is absolutely no coincidence we don’t even have a retired player who has come out,” Greene said. “I think the culture is indicative of what we are seeing in 2023.

“It speaks volumes that no one has felt comfortable enough. Obviously coming out is an incredible personal journey within itself. No one should ever feel pressure to do anything.

“The AFL as a governing body is doing stuff all. If any change is going to happen it is going to happen from the players and the clubs themselves.”

One well-known footballer, who played throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, was forced to move overseas once his career was over so that he could come out.

While there is a full Pride Round in the AFLW, the men’s competition has only one game dedicated to the cause and it will be played by Sydney and St Kilda at the SCG in Round 13 this year.

There is universal agreement around the AFL that there would be no problems at any club if a player were to reveal himself as gay.

“One hundred per cent we would handle it, embrace it and in some ways love it. It would be great for the club,” one AFL coach said.

Given the racial abuse that Western Bulldogs star Jamarra Ugle-Hagan received two weeks ago, sadly it’s impossible to say a gay player wouldn’t be abused at a game or on social media.

In many ways the conversation goes back to what Sydney champion Adam Goodes went through with racism.

If you’re the first gay AFL player, your name would be attached to that forever. You become the reference point.

“You will always be a part of the conversation even if you don’t want to. That’s a big responsibility,” one club official said. “The expectation is that they will be a spokesperson and advocate for social change around this issue and always being asked to advocate when they may not want to. That is a big problem.

“I don’t think anyone inside the game cares, but it’s all those peripheral elements where there would be a problem.”

AFL Players’ Association chief executive Paul Marsh said the continued speculation “about player sexuality is wrong”.

“We don’t speculate about whether players are straight, and that attention will only further hinder any chance of a non-heterosexual AFL player feeling comfortable to be themselves,” Marsh said.

AFLPA boss Paul Marsh. Picture: AAP Images

“Our industry would unquestionably welcome, love and support any non-heterosexual AFL players who are comfortable to be openly themselves in our competition, just as we have seen for years in the AFLW competition.

“But no player should feel pressured to make these decisions until and unless the time is right for those individuals.”

For the player who does become the AFL’s “first”, he would walk into a financial windfall similar to A-League player Josh Cavallo, who attracted several lucrative sponsorship deals after his courageous decision to come out publicly.

“Whoever did come out, imagine how much money they would make? Every magazine cover, every brand would be throwing money at him, it would be huge,” one leading marketer said.

Greene says it’s all about visibility and recalls a recent conversation she had with NBL star Isaac Humphries, who came out as the first openly gay player in a top-tier men’s basketball league in November.

“I spoke to Isaac a month ago and he is a different person. He’s like, ‘people stop me on the street. I didn’t actually realise how big things were and then someone stops me on the street and says I came out because of you or I never thought I could play basketball and be gay,” she explains.

“That visibility is just game-changing for people, so I think (an AFL player coming out) is definitely going to happen at some stage. Do I think it is super close? Unsure and then messages like Gill’s don’t help.”

The reality is the AFL’s first gay male footballer might be currently playing in the under-15s down at your local club, who by the time he’s ready to be drafted will already be openly gay and proud of it.

“It might take someone who is already out and who gets drafted into a club,” Greene says. “In terms of it being the most organic way possible, it might be the 14 or 15-year-old in junior footy right now who is ready.

“Someone who doesn’t care and is like, ‘I’m not coming out, I’m already out’.”

Originally published as Dented pride: The reality for gay AFL footballers and why the men’s game is stuck in a vortex