Indigenous AFL Star Eddie Betts Targeted In ‘Disgusting’ Banana Throwing Incident

The fan was filmed throwing the banana at Betts in a racially motivated attack during Saturday night’s clash between Port Adelaide and Adelaide Crows.

“We’re investigating the incident, we’ve identified the person responsible”, Port Adelaide Football Club Chairman David Kochsaid during a press conference.

Despite the best efforts of the spectator in question, the Adelaide Crows won the match and Betts was chaired off the field by his teammates.

SHAUN Burgoyne says Saturday night’s late-game incident with Eddie Betts provides the AFL industry another chance to reinforce cultural awareness issues relating to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander players.

“We want fans to be passionate and cheer for their team, but there’s a line and it was clearly crossed on this occasion”.

Discussing the incident, which quickly made the rounds on social media, Koch said “it’s absolutely unacceptable to throw any object onto the field of play at any time, we have a code of conduct that expressly forbids that crowd behaviour“.

If you refuse to believe that a significant percentage of our community continue to cling tightly, or even unconsciously, to old-world bigotry, consider some of the tweets I received about the Betts incident. She has also removed social media profiles and reportedly made it hard for the football club to contact her.

“That’s all well and good for Gil and he did a good job there, but I think Port Adelaide got on the front foot early”.

Betts did not attend a Crows recovery session on Sunday and has since kept a low profile but was “doing OK” said Adelaide chief chief executive Andrew Fagan.

South Australian Premier Jay Weatherill also took to social media to condemn the incident, describing the woman as an “idiot”.

“All we have to do is just educate (people)”.

He said the banana incident was “unambiguously racist” but he’s been buoyed by the way fellow supporters, players and officials had responded.

The incident was caught on camera by nearby fans.

Don said he was yet to speak to his 27-year-old daughter, who he said lived with her mother and had “gone to ground”.

“Hopefully, we can all learn something from this weekend”.