LEIGH LEOPARDS star Josh Charnley has broken his silence on the “horrible” incident with former Warrington Wolves forward Josh McGuire that targeted the former’s disabled son.
McGuire and Charnley had gone head-to-head in the 2023 pre-season, with the former banned for the first seven games of the season after being charged with Grade F ‘Unacceptable Language’.
When Warrington went up against Leigh early on in the 2023 Super League season, another incident occurred, with McGuire then given a 12-game ban for ‘Unacceptable Language’ which was described as “derogatory and negative – term of abuse and disparagement towards disabled individuals”.
The Wolves subsequently released McGuire with the ex-Brisbane Broncos and St George Illawarra Dragons forward moving back to Australia.
Charnley’s son, Axel, suffers with autism and now the veteran winger has, in an emotional statement, revealed what he felt at the time.
“We didn’t really want to speak about it, we tried keeping it quite close to our chest but the incident at Warrington, we had to come out and speak about it,” Charnley said on BBC Radio 5 Live.
“We thought we were protecting Axel with people not knowing about it, we didn’t even tell our parents, just wanted to keep it to us until Zoe was comfortable speaking about it.
“But ever since the incident it came out, and it was in all the press and it was getting leaked everywhere that we had a disabled kid, we had to actually voice it ourselves.
“It was horrible. I’ve never experienced anything like that, I don’t think any other player will ever experience something that another player has said about his son.
“I actually wanted to quit the sport and be away from it all because you don’t target someone’s kid.”
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