The NRL has left the door open for Tyrone May to return to the game as they prepare to hand down their findings in the James Tedesco ‘Squid Game’ case.
May had his contract ripped up by Penrith last week following his controversial social media post after the grand final.
Tyrone May has not had the door shut on him by the NRL.Credit: NRL Photos, Instagram
The NRL fined May $7500 for “social media posts which do not align with the values of the game”, but the Panthers opted to take the matter further and shredded his one-year extension for the 2022 season.
May narrowly avoided a jail sentence in 2020 after pleading guilty to four counts of intentionally recording an intimate image without consent. The saga appeared to be over when the victim began civil proceedings against May, with the parties settling out of court earlier this year.
While no NRL club has offered May a lifeline as yet, NRL boss Andrew Abdo said the 25-year-old had not been blacklisted for good.
The game has previously re-registered Matt Lodge and Russell Packer, who both served jail time for violent criminal offences.
Tyrone May is best friends with Panthers co-captain Nathan Cleary.Credit: NRL Photos
“We will always be open to any proposal that is put in front of us and give it the absolute attention it requires and then make a call,” Abdo said. “There is no edict to say ‘player X’ can’t be registered.
“I was asked after the grand final if I was disappointed with the negative headlines coming out of some of the instances we had seen from the Panthers.
“I’m always disappointed when rugby league is in the headlines for the wrong reasons. We want to make sure we’re making the best decisions and we’re in the headlines for the right reasons.
“That’s not to say any player or any person is under a cloud of not being welcome in our game. That’s a big call. We don’t make those calls too often.
“Any registration for any player that is put to us by a club and the player is considered, we run through a due process, we do it very fair and objectively, so there are no constraints around that.”
May came off the bench in the Panthers’ grand final victory and was used as a centre in last year’s decider. He came through the grades as a playmaker.
Meanwhile, Abdo said the NRL were finalising their investigation into an incident involving Tedesco allegedly shouting ‘squid games’ at a woman outside a Bondi hotel.
The Sydney Roosters and NSW Blues captain maintained it was a misunderstanding after Tiffany Trinh, who is of Vietnamese descent, told the Herald last month she was launching a formal complaint to the NRL over the incident, which she felt was a “joke about her race”.
Abdo, who could hand down their Tedesco findings in the next 24 hours, said: “We have been actively investigating and hope to conclude that investigation this week. It’s a matter we take really seriously. The allegations were pretty serious, we want to make sure we do a thorough investigation and then comment on it afterwards.”
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