Footy captain posts about Covid play breach

A Newport footy club at the centre of a Covid cluster has come under fire after its captain posted an image online that may show him breaking Covid rules.

Newport Football Club captain Munir El Houli has come under fire for a social media post.

A footy club at the centre of this month’s Hobsons Bay cluster has come under fire after its captain posted an image that may show him breaking new Covid rules.

Newport Football Club captain Munir El Houli posted a picture of his two children playing on a swing set at a public playground to his social media page on Tuesday.

Mr El Houli was recently plunged into a mandatory 14-day quarantine after another player at the club tested positive for Covid.

The post was captioned with the hashtag #letusplay and said: “Didn’t have to wait in line for anything thanks to the sheep isolating their kids indoors.”

It comes Victorian health authorities forced the closure of public playgrounds on Monday amid fears of the dangerous Delta variant spreading among children.

The image has since been deleted but screen grabs of the post have been supplied to the Herald Sun.

Mr El Houli denied breaking the current Covid rules and said it was an “old photo” that he had uploaded.

However he was unable to provide a time stamp of the original photo to clear the record.

“I am a family man, all about my kids,” he said.

“I am just frustrated, I run a business and on my day off I can’t take my kids to the park.

“What is going on isn’t fair. I don’t agree with the rules and closing down of parks. I haven’t done anything wrong.”

He said his local parks had been cordoned off with tape and it would’ve been impossible for him to defy health orders in broad daylight without locals seeing him.

“I’m not going to go there and break tapes and put them on the swings,” he added.

Some of the first cases linked to Melbourne’s most recent coronavirus outbreak came from the Newport Football Club, after an Al-Taqwa College teacher tested positive to the virus and spread it to her partner, who plays for the team.

Mr El Houli was forced to isolate for 14 days as a Tier 1 contact of the player.

Newport football club President Marwan, who did not supply his surname, said it had “nothing to do with the club” and it was a personal decision of Mr El Houli to defy CHO orders.

Marwan added that it was “very unlikely” that Mr El Houli would break the rules, and said he was a decent man.

Covid rule breakers can face a $1652 fine for disobeying the stay at home orders under Victoria’s state of emergency.