An Australian transgender woman, Jamie Gumbrell, born male, has sparked outrage after she won the Women’s Croquet World Championship.
Jamie had first competed in the game in 2019 as a male, but did not win. He then transitioned into a woman and came back in 2023 to compete in the women category and won.
Jamie Gumbrell claimed women’s croquet’s top trophy in Brighton in the UK back in August when she beat 2011 world champion and current European champion Rachael Gee from England.
The 23-year-old from Canberra was one of the youngest competitors at the world championships.
The world championships are held every four years and Gumbrell won the women’s title at her first attempt.
Gumbrell was born a biological male but according to the UK’s Telegraph, she began identifying as a female when Croquet returned from the pandemic.
The World Croquet Federation changed its transgender policy two years ago to allow competitors to nominate the gender they “persistently and consistently” use.
According to the Telegraph, some of the competitors who arrived to play at the world championships knew they would be competing against a biological male.
“There was a huge amount of disquiet. But nobody was prepared to say or do anything,” England’s Sue Lightbody said.
“I was quite sick about the situation. We thought it would go against us, that we wouldn’t be picked for another team. Everything was hush-hush, everyone was worried about being called transphobic.
“People told me not to get involved, saying, ‘Don’t do anything, you’ll make yourself very unpopular’. But this just shouldn’t happen. It fundamentally isn’t fair.”
The president of the WCF told the newspaper: “The fact that Jamie was assigned male at birth is not disputed by anyone. Jamie now identifies as female as her entry into the world championship was determined in accordance with our policy, approved by our members in April 2021.”
Players at the world championships believed Gumbrell had an unfair advantage because she went through male puberty before deciding to compete in the women’s division.UK
One player said Gumbrell’s opponent in the final, Gee, was crying behind her sunglasses at the end of the competition.
There were several comments about Gumbrell on social media, including from former Liberal candidate and Sky News Australia contributor Katherine Deves.
“I apologise to the Women’s World Croquet Champion Rachel Gee for my fellow Australian, Jamie Gumbrell,” she wrote on X.
Another wrote: “The first known case of a women’s global title being awarded to a male. Australia’s Jamie Gumbrell, who was competing as a male in 2019. But, during the pandemic, he began identifying as female and in August became the women’s world champion at the first attempt.”
Gumbrell previously competed in Australia winning the Under 21 Singles Championship in 2020 and winning the Doubles Championship in 2019 and 2020 with Ethan Gumbrell.
