Alberti: Gordon spat is history
Susan Alberti wants to move on from her feud with Peter Gordon, declaring that their much-publicised spat is “history”.
Alberti, a Bulldogs benefactor and former vice-president of the club, made headlines last year after she publicly condemned the Dogs having been denied entry to the main entrance of the Whitten Oval ahead of an AFLW game between the Bulldogs and Carlton.
The incident brought the split between Dogs president Gordon, and Alberti - who held the two leading positions on the club’s board at the time of the Bulldogs’ drought-breaking premiership in 2016 - into the public spotlight.
Despite saying that she wasn’t invited to the club’s women’s season launch, Alberti said this week that she was looking to put the divide behind her, and would be attending the Dogs’ AFLW season opener away to Adelaide on Saturday night.
“I’m going to Adelaide on Saturday because I want to support the women. I’m very fond of them. Not just Bulldogs players, I support the entire league,” Alberti said.
“I’ll be there at all the Bulldogs games, and cheering on the Dogs, as I do, but it’s more to me than just the Bulldogs, it’s about all women.”
As for her relationship with Gordon, Alberti suggested the pair would be able to be amicable in the future.
“I haven’t had anything to do with Peter in the last little while. I’m sure we’ll be fine when we get to meet one another again. It’s just one of those things that happened. It shouldn’t have happened, it was insulting, it hurt terribly, but the club is bigger than any individual. Let’s move on, that’s history.
“To me it’s a bigger picture. It is quite sad, but that’s how it is. I’ll be there, and I’ll be cheering on the red, white and blue.”
Alberti, a long-time advocate of women's football, meanwhile praised the AFL for the way the women’s competition had grown, but acknowledged there remained issues that needed to be addressed, especially at the grassroots level.
“The evolution has been incredible. It’s grown very quickly. And I think the AFL are doing a good job. They’re really doing a lot of research, a lot of homework, to make sure we get it right, because we’ve got this one opportunity to get it right from its infancy.
“We need to get the talent right, we need the facilities right. They’re not too good in some places, for men and the women.
“I’ve seen some appalling facilities. And we cannot expect our women, our little girls, [for] their mothers to let them go and play. I’ve seen urinals, and one toilet with no door. And that’s just not on for our young girls, and also for young men.”
Alberti also said that an 18-team women’s competition was only a matter of time.