Glen Quartermain: West Coast Eagles star Jack Darling joins list of athletes dividing sport fans

Jack Darling has made habit of polarising. West Coast’s premiership forward is truly elite when he is in the zone, but regularly maligned for on-field gaffes. When he plays big, he is BIG. When he clangs, he CLANGS. Now he has become a lightning rod for COVID. A flagship to anti-vaxxers, not so palatable to those who believe he should simply get the jab and honour his AFL contract. Meanwhile, the Eagles wait patiently for an answer from Jack, their care for the individual admirable, but their forward line ravaged by injury and the season coming on faster than Jack Petruccelle on a break. In the US, New York Nets superstar Kyrie Irving has been stuck in a complex twilight zone. The NBA team initially baulked at Irving playing altogether, but caved into popular protest, allowing the unvaccinated guard to play only in road games – but not against the New York Knicks and Toronto Raptors. Now there is renewed hope for a home appearance with New York Mayor Eric Adams announcing he has a plan to end the city’s vaccine mandate for indoor spaces, including arenas such as Barclays Center and Madison Square Garden. It is unlikely the AFL will alter its double jab or no play policy, even contemplating making the booster compulsory. Novak Djokovic’s anti-vaxx stance that forced his expulsion from Australia before the Open threatened relations with his home country of Serbia. Largely vilified in Australia but still loved on a grand scale elsewhere, the Djoker is a truly polarising figure. Darling, Irving and Djokovic are the latest examples of sportsmen and women who have forged great dividing ranges in sport. Here’s a few prominent ones: COLIN KAEPERNICK When San Francisco quarterback Colin Kaepernick “took a seat” during the US national anthem prior to a pre-season game in 2016, it sent a depth charge that stoked an undercurrent of unrest and outrage across the US. Buoyed by an unrestrainable groundswell, he raised it a notch the following week and “took a knee”, in protest “against the lack of attention given to the issues of racial inequality and police brutality in the United States”. It was symbolic and provocative, just as it was when civil rights leader Martin Luther King took a knee in Alabama in 1965 to show solidarity with protestors. Then US President Donald Trump in September 2017 called on NFL owners to “fire” players who protested during the national anthem. The move to quell the uprising failed as Trump watched the “knee” take hold all over the globe Athletes at this year’s Commonwealth Games in Birmingham will be allowed to take a knee or display a symbol in solidarity with a cause after organisers unveiled a set of “guiding principles” for athlete advocacy on Wednesday. Australian athletes can wave an Aboriginal or Pride flag during a victory lap, raise a fist on the podium or speak out in favour of other social justice causes. How times have changed since John Carlos, Tommie Smith and Peter Norman challenged racism with the infamous Black Power Salute after the 200m final at Mexico 1968 Olympics. Norman was never selected for Australia again, despite the fact his 20.10sec silver medal finish in that final remains the Oceania record to this day. MUHAMMAD ALI Muhammad Ali was a boxer, poet, devout muslim and civil rights leader during a hostile period for African-American athletes. Ali’s confidence, strong beliefs and powerful presence in the boxing ring as the world heavyweight champion allowed him to cut through the ignorance. Those who saw him as a misguided troublemaker who denounced his alignment with the Nation of Islam, rejoiced on April 28, 1967, when with the United States at war in Vietnam, Ali refused to be inducted into the army. “I ain’t got no quarrel with those Vietcong,” he said. Ali was convicted of draft evasion, sentenced to five years in prison, fined $10,000 and had his boxing licence stripped. His attorneys spent the next four years appealing that verdict before the US Supreme Court unanimously quashed his conviction. Post-prison, Ali won back many of the hearts and minds of those who opposed his views through his actions in the ring and his blockbuster fights with George Foreman and Joe Frazier. CASTER SEMENYA The South African dual 800m Olympic gold medallist and three-time world champion was the catalyst for a gender divide, none of it from her own making. Born an intersex woman, Semenya was assigned female gender at birth with XY chromosomes that gave her naturally elevated testosterone levels. After complaints from fellow athletes following a decisive victory at the 2009 world Championships, Semenya was forced to have “sex testing”. She was cleared to compete. But the controversy was never far away and in 2019 new world athletics rules prevented her from competing in the 400m, 800m and 1500m events unless she took medication to suppress her testosterone levels. She challenged it at to the Court of Arbitration for Sport and lost and an appeal in the Swiss Court was also defeated. Semenya is now waiting on an appeal with the European Court of Human Rights. “It’s taking the soul out of my body,” she told the Guardian. “They want me to take my own system down. I’m not sick. I don’t need drugs. I will never do that.” MARGARET COURT A record 24 grand slam singles titles puts Margaret Court one ahead of Serena Williams and with the American on the decline, it may not be broken for decades. But 45 years after she retired, Court dominates headlines for her strident religious views of the LGBTQ community and her fierce opposition to same-sex marriage. The block back has always been fierce at every level. Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews said her “disgraceful and hurtful” views should not be honoured when she was made a Companion in the General Division of the AO. In 2003, Melbourne Park Stadium was named Margaret Court Arena in her honour with 18-time grand slam champion Martina Navratilova leading the opposition to the change. BEN COUSINS Geelong great Gary Ablett Sr had to wait several years before his 2005 induction into the Australian Football Hall of Fame. His inclusion would have been a simple rubber stamp if not for a troublesome private life. North Melbourne legend Wayne Carey, who many consider the greatest player of all time, had to wait two years after eligibility before he was inducted in 2008, the weight of his off-field troubles with drugs weighing heavily on the AFHOF selection committee. So what of Cousins, whose battle with drug dependence and jail time has courted outrage and compassion in equal measure, with his fan base now hopeful his latest efforts to rehabilitate will stick. Listed by respected footy scribe Mike Sheahan as one of the 50 greatest players of all time, Cousins has a flag, a Brownlow, six All-Australian blazers and four John Worsfold medals as Eagles best-and-fairest. The Hall of Fame committee considers candidates, who are eligible after they have been retired from the game for five years, on the basis of “record, ability, integrity, sportsmanship and character”. Carey and Ablett Sr did their time. If Cousins stays clean, he might be rewarded too.

Glen Quartermain: West Coast Eagles star Jack Darling joins list of athletes dividing sport fans

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