Todd Carney’s bubbler incident left him with fears to go to the toilet

Former NRL bad boy says fallout from his notorious career-ending bubbler incident has left him fearful to carry out the most basic human necessity.

Former Cronulla Sharks star Todd Carney has admitted “the hardest part” about his notorious bubbler incident has been feeling anxious to go to the toilet.

The Dally M winner, who was booted from the Cronulla Sharks in 2014 after a photo emerged of the now 34 year-old urinating in his own mouth, participated in ABC show Reputation Rehab to discuss the incident and fallout.

“The hardest part for me was if we’re at a pub and I want to go to the toilet I have to (hype) myself up or I have to make sure there aren’t heaps of people in the toilet,” he told hosts Kirsten Drysdale and Zoë Norton Lodge.

Todd Carney now works as a concreter on the Gold Coast. Picture: Peter Wallis

“If I walk towards the toilet and there’s a group of guys on the way to the toilet I’ll turn around.

“If they notice me they start (yelling) ‘Carney give us a bubbler’, and I just start laughing but you turn around and there’s two or three blokes doing it.”

Carney said he did not believe he deserved the punishment for the “prank”, however it was an accumulation of bad behaviour – drink driving, reckless driving, a car chase with the cops, vandalism and a smattering of other incidents – that tipped the Sharks over the edge, despite the fact that the aforementioned offences took place during his time at other clubs.

“It’s been well documented, my pitfalls, as I call them, my ups and downs. Stupidity,” he said.

Shark's Todd Carney attempts to bust the tackle of Rooster's James Maloney. Picture Gregg Porteous

“Now I sit back and look at my career – I had chances. I just think that last thing at Cronulla was a sad way to go out. What I’d done didn’t deserve the punishment I got but the game had enough of my stupid antics.

“I needed to be living my life like a professional athlete and 97 per cent of the time I done that, it’s just the little three per cent was every time I slipped up.

“Because I didn’t get in trouble all the times, it’s just when I was letting my hair down.”

Through a 2020 lens, other guests on the show said they believed Carney was in fact the victim in this scenario, having the photograph posted on social media without his consent and comparing it to revenge porn, which now carries heavy penalties.

Carney with his girlfriend Susie Bradley. Pic: Instagram

This was still something Carney grappled with.

“I didn’t think someone would be the type,” he said of the person who posted the infamous image.

“I woke up the next morning and that had been out there.”

In happier news, yesterday it was revealed that Carney is expecting his first child with Married At First Sight alumnus Susie Bradley, 26.

Originally published as Todd Carney’s bubbler incident left him with fears to go to the toilet