The National Times - Australian Rules chief 'exasperated' by online racial abuse

Australia's most popular spectator sport, similar to Ireland's Gaelic football, has long waged a battle against racism on and off the field.

It reared its head again in recent days with online slurs targeting four Indigenous players across three clubs -- Adelaide Crows, Fremantle Dockers and Brisbane Lions.

The sport's integrity unit has launched an investigation and McLachlan pledged to hunt down the culprits, but conceded it was difficult.

"It's pretty hard when often these accounts are shut down as quickly as they are opened up," he said late Wednesday, adding that the abuse was "a disgrace, it's abhorrent".

"We are taking the action we can. We work hard to track them down but we know they disappear, and I'm exasperated."

The Australian Football League, the game's governing body, began proactively tackling racism in the 1990s.

That included adopting a policy that made it an offence for players or officials to insult someone because of their race, religion, ethnicity, colour, nationality or background.

But underlying problems persist.

The retired Betts, one of Australia's highest-profile Indigenous athletes, said he was not surprised by the latest incidents because "it happens all the time".

"Enough's enough. When are we going to see a stance?" he said on Fox Sports.

The abuse came just weeks after Western Bulldogs player Jamarra Ugle-Hagan raised his jersey and pointed to his skin in a show of defiance after saying he was abused from the stands against St Kilda.

Betts, who once had a banana thrown at him by a spectator and was depicted as a monkey by trolls on Twitter, said: "They don't like Aboriginal people standing up for what they believe in and trying to stamp out racism.

"It feels like they want to put us back down in our boxes where they think we belong," he added.

"It is disappointing to see. We just have to continue to keep educating. We're seeing change, but it's always going to happen."

T.F.Russell--TNT