NRL 2023: Josh McGuire opens up on his battle with depression, abuse and regrets over leaving the Broncos
He has the worst rap sheet in NRL history and was embroiled in a Super League sledging scandal. Now former Broncos star Josh McGuire tells all in a raw, candid and explosive interview.
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Josh McGuire says he regrets quitting the Broncos and has broken his silence on the explosive Super League sledging scandal that drove the former Queensland Origin star out of rugby league.
In the most candid interview of his 15-year career, NRL bad boy McGuire opened up about his battle with depression and dark thoughts, how he “hated” himself and why he left the Broncos for all the wrong reasons.
McGuire also delivered a fascinating insight into the mind of an NRL enforcer. He spoke of his “nasty streak”, playing blind in one eye for 12 years, his personal struggle with his tag as a rugby league villain and the pain of social-media abuse.
“It’s not until you get away from football and take a step back that I realised I was a dick,” McGuire says.
“I have some regrets. I stopped treating people the way I was taught to treat people growing up.”
THE SLUR
For the first time, McGuire details what really happened over his Super League firestorm.
In his very first game for Warrington in February, McGuire sledged Leigh rival and fellow Australian Tom Amone.
England’s Rugby football League found McGuire guilty of disability discrimination and banned him for seven matches.
“This is the story,” McGuire tells.
“Me and Amone were having words during the game. I have never shied away from being lippy and sledging. He was getting into me and I was getting into him.
“I personally don’t give a s*** what people call me on the field. Sledging happens all the time.
“Anyway, we scored late in the game, so I ran past Amone and said, ‘Sucked in, you spazzo’.
“I didn’t think anything of it, but then their winger Josh Charnley reported me to the referee and it ends up at the judiciary.
“Amone also got sent to the judiciary for sledging our players.
“In England, the clubs talk and collude. So Leigh called us and said, ‘If you drop the charge (against Amone), we’ll drop ours (against McGuire)’. We said, ‘Sweet’.
“The judiciary asked us (Warrington) to testify, but we claimed we didn’t hear anything, so the Amone charge gets chucked out.
“Our case goes ahead and everyone drops it except their winger (Charnley), who says I made a disability slur — which I did — and I end up copping seven weeks.
“Obviously I regret what happened. It was a throwaway line in the heat of the moment. I didn’t mean to offend people with disabilities. I shouldn’t have said it.”
THE DECEIT
McGuire then copped a second ban — a monster 12-week suspension in May — which ostensibly ended his rugby league career.
This time, McGuire insists he was the victim of a malicious lie. The fallout convinced him to negotiate a severance package with Warrington and return home to Australia, also fuelled by his three-year-old daughter being diagnosed with severe hearing loss.
Warrington and Leigh were again facing off. There was already tension following the pre-season McGuire-Amone sledging drama. The RFL again banned McGuire following complaints from a Leigh winger that he used the word ‘retard’.
McGuire claims that Leigh winger was Charnley, who had previously played for Warrington. The former Maroons prop is adamant he never repeated the disability slur.
“The second time I didn’t use any slur. That’s the truth,” McGuire said.
“Naturally, I was filthy that Charnley testified against me (over the Amone incident), so this time, the whole team is getting stuck into him (Charnley) the whole game.
“I was trying to hurt him in tackles. I was headbutting him in tackles and roughing him up and then he jumps up and makes the claim that I called him a retard.
“In my mind, he lied.
“We were all giving it to him about the Amone stuff, calling him a ‘snitch’ and a ‘grass’, but it was nothing compared to what I was accused of.
“At the judiciary, I had four player statements on my behalf to corroborate my story that I never called him a retard.
“Charnley had eight teammates in proximity to the supposed incident and not one of them testified against me, but they ruled in his favour.
“The judiciary deemed I wasn’t a credible witness, so I copped a 12-week ban.
“I felt it was personal against me in the end. I thought if that’s how things go, if someone can lie when there’s no proof I said it, and rule against me, I’m done.
“I retired on the spot.”
THE VILLAIN
McGuire accepts when you play with fire, at some point you get burnt.
He doesn’t profess to be a rugby league saint.
Manly front-row legend Mark ‘Spudd’ Carroll last year labelled McGuire a “human grub” after another suspension at the Dragons.
The 33-year-old owns the worst rap sheet in NRL history, amassing a record 28 charges totalling 30 weeks of suspensions and $16,000 in fines for various acts of foul play.
“I definitely felt misunderstood,” he said. ”But don’t get me wrong, I brought a lot of stuff on myself.
“I made my bed and I slept in it.
“To be honest, I was getting away with it for so long. When I was a young fella coming through, it was always encouraged to be more aggressive, to push the limits.
“I remember being told as a 19-year-old at the Broncos, go out there and smash Johnathan Thurston (former Cowboys halfback). You flogged the best players.
“Rugby league rewarded me for that aggression by playing for Queensland and Australia.
“When you act a certain way for so long, people start to see you that way and thought, ‘OK, I’ll be the bad guy. I’ll be the villain if that’s what you think of me’.
“Things became toxic for me in the NRL. It wasn’t anyone else’s fault. The game is great now and there is a real emphasis on player welfare, but when the game changed, got cleaner, I didn’t really know how to change or even if I wanted to change.
“I guess I was a rugby league dinosaur in the end.”
THE BATTLE
McGuire’s footballing resume, on paper, is remarkable. He played 259 NRL games, 14 Origin matches for Queensland, 15 Tests for Australia and Samoa. In 2017, he won the Ron McAuliffe Medal as Queensland’s best player in a team that contained legends Thurston, Cameron Smith and Cooper Cronk.
But amid his achievements, he waged a silent battle with depression, a struggle fuelled by vicious social-media abuse of his playing style.
“It’s something that will be going on for the rest of my life, but that’s my own battle,” he says.
“Everyone has their own battles and their own fights. We all deal with it differently I guess.
“Even today, I’m honest enough to say I have a nasty streak. That’s something I have had since I was young. I grew up nasty. To be a professional rugby league player, you have to have some nastiness in you I reckon.
“It’s taken a lot of self-reflection. I’ve hated myself at times.
“People would see me for 80 minutes each week, see some of the stupid stuff I would do, and they probably come up with a decision or opinion of me.
“I would read stuff about me and then start believing it. I would think, ‘OK they think I’m bad so I’ll be bad’.
“I got away from social media when I went to some dark places, but I am much happier now and in a better place.
“I don’t take any medication (for his depression), but I have talk to different people. I talk to different psychologists on how to deal with things and not letting my emotion and ego get the better of me.
“It’s nice to be able to talk so honestly and candidly. I don’t have to be politically correct anymore or worry about upsetting someone in the NRL by saying the wrong thing.
“You can put on different masks in certain situations, but I am definitely a different person around my kids, my wife and my brothers to what people saw of me as an NRL player.
“I have a great family with great support. I’m in a much better place than I ever have been in my life.”
THE BRONCOS
McGuire’s sudden exit from the Broncos at the end of 2018 to join derby rivals the Cowboys remains one of Brisbane’s great contract mysteries.
Until now.
A year earlier, McGuire had inked a mega four-year upgrade at Brisbane. Then, within weeks of Anthony Seibold being named Broncos coach, McGuire was off to Townsville for 2019.
There were whispers Seibold didn’t like McGuire’s style and wanted to move him on. ‘Moose’ says he made the call, chasing cash over contentment.
“I regret leaving the Broncos. I wish I never left,” he says.
“I regret making decisions based on money.
“I had just signed a four-year extension with the Broncos. It was good money, but because Wayne (Bennett) was leaving, I had a clause in my contract that I could get out if he wasn’t the coach.
“The Cowboys came along. They knew what I was on and they offered me more money.
“I stood to make another $800,000 by going to the Cowboys, so I made the decision purely based on money. ‘Seibs’ was coming in and I didn’t know him. I knew Paul Green (then Cowboys coach) from his time at the Broncos when I was young and I got on well with him.
“Don’t get me wrong, I loved my time at the Cowboys and I made a lot of good friends, but I just made my decisions based wanting more money instead of just being happy.
“I was settled at the Broncos, my family was here in Brisbane and I had great relationships with people in that organisation.
“If I had my time again, I would have stayed.”
LOVE IS BLIND
Love him or loathe him, McGuire ability to survive and thrive in the NRL, playing half-blind for a decade, is admirable.
By rights, he could have retired in 2011. He copped an accidental poke in the eye from teammate Mitchell Dodds in a game against the Bulldogs. At age 21, he lost sight in his left eye.
“I played my whole NRL career pretty much with one eye. I’ve been blind for more than 10 years,” he said.
“It will never get any better. My eye is there for decoration really. I haven‘t been able to see out of my eye since 2011.
“That’s why I do that weird squinting thing that everyone gives me shit about. It helps me focus my good eye to see what’s happening.
“It‘s another journey, you have the highs and lows and one low was getting poked in the eye and losing my eyesight. It was a sheer accident from ’Doddsy’. It detached my retina and collapsed my eye. They had to rebuild it.
“I now have a cataract so the eye is turning white. Michael Bisping in the MMA has the same thing.
“I can’t go on roller-coasters or skydiving because of the pressure on my eye.
“I got told not to play NRL ever again, but I wasn’t good at anything else so I said stuff it, I will keep playing.
“They said it was a big risk and if I got another poke my eye could completely collapse and I would have to remove my eye, but all I wanted to do was play NRL.
“It was hard catching the ball. I got whacked plenty of times when I didn’t see a shot coming, but I just managed to deal with it.
“I can’t remember what it’s like to have two eyes.”
THE FUTURE
McGuire has landed on his feet. He is working in strategic partnerships for Professional Bull Riders Australia and hasn’t ruled out playing park football in Brisbane to give something back to the game.
“I am definitely proud of what I achieved. Winning the Ron McAuliffe Medal when we had Thurston, Cam Smith and Slater in the team, I felt like I really belonged in the Origin arena,” he said.
“I wouldn’t mind coming back and helping some young kids avoid the mistakes I made.
“If I could give advice to any young NRL players now, I would say it‘s not always about money.
“Don’t make decisions just based on cash. Financially, it put me in a good position but I wasn’t always happy as a result.
“I could have done things differently, but I feel very blessed to have my wife and kids and being around my family and friends back home in Brisbane.
“I can be myself and just speak from the heart.”
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