The first time Australian Football League icon Susan Alberti (front) saw Moana Hope (far left), she was shocked by the footballer’s bold tattoos. When Hope saw Alberti, she was shocked by her coiffed hair and swanky jewels. “I thought, is this the Australian Oprah? I’d never seen diamonds like that, except for in Titanic!”
But the two soon discovered they had more in common than they could have ever imagined. Both grew up in housing commissions, both had endured great grief (Hope’s father passed away when she was 12, while Alberti tragically lost her first husband and only daughter), and both loved Australian Rules footy. “As a 15-year-old girl in the ’60s, I was forced to stop playing due to the risk of getting hurt. It broke my heart,” says Alberti. “I said, ‘One day this is not going to happen. Women should be able to play this sport if that’s what they choose to do.’ And that dream never left me.”
After years of campaigning – and funding her local women’s competition – Alberti was overjoyed when the professional AFL Women’s competition came to fruition in 2017. “I cried my eyes out during the first game,” she recalls. “I felt so much pride watching these strong women play. Thanks to them we may see a change in [our] sporting culture.”
The women of the league, pictured here at a photo shoot in the inaugural season, are forever grateful to Alberti. “Sue gives everyone pump-ups,” says Hope. “She’s awesome. I’ve asked her to adopt me but she hasn’t taken me up [on that] yet.” Adds Alberti, “If I could choose a daughter, it would be Mo … But I feel like a mother to all 600,000 girls playing AFL around Australia.”
Read the full story in the April issue of marie claire, out now.
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