Mother's day plea: My son Todd Carney deserves a second chance

They are milestone days that people remember for many reasons: Melbourne Cup Day, Valentine’s Day and Mother’s Day are significant to people for very different reasons.

Not everyone gets involved with the ponies or gets lucky in love, but Leanne Carney, the ever-patient and loving mother of Todd Carney, will never forget them.

Mother's love: Leanne and Todd Carney after presentation of the 2010 Dally M medal.

When so many people were celebrating Rekindling’s Melbourne Cup win last year, Leanne was dealing with a diagnosis of breast cancer.

‘‘I didn’t want to tell Todd, but I had to,’’ she said. ‘‘I’d been for some tests and thought there’d be nothing wrong with me. But I got the news and I just was in shock. I remember ringing Todd with the news. He was just silent on the other end of the phone.’’

Todd had already lost his father when the former NRL star was just 20. ‘‘Daryl [Todd’s father] was his mentor from the age of four,’’ Leanne said. ‘‘I don’t think anyone knew then or now how badly that affected him.’’

Like his silence on the phone when his mum called. ‘‘He didn’t say it, but I know he would have thought about his dad,’’ Leanne said. ‘‘Since his dad died, me and his sisters ... we’ve just been so close as a unit. It really made us so tight.’’

It’s why Todd was at the hospital with his mum on Valentine’s Day as she underwent her second round of surgery. He was there for the first operation, too. ‘‘He really didn’t leave my side,’’ Leanne said. ‘‘Along with his sisters, he has been amazing.’’

Todd had a football comeback to try to launch, and he was accepted back into the Cowboys ranks, but when his mum came to visit a few weeks ago he knew that he couldn’t be up north for another day while she was battling cancer back in NSW.

‘‘I’m going through all of the treatment and when I was up in Cairns with him my hair was coming out ... I think that the reality of it all hit there and then,’’ Leanne said. ‘‘Before that, it wasn’t as real for him. We had been FaceTiming every day, but this was real and he told me he couldn’t be so far away from me. I was really touched, but I told him quite clearly that I didn’t want him to come home for me and that he had to get his career on the road with the Cowboys.

‘‘But he insisted. He said he needed to be up the road from me, if not with me, during this time. I couldn’t change his mind. And I know just how badly he wants to finish his career in the NRL – and he still wants that to this day. He is desperate to play again, but he put me above all of that.’’
So, on Mother’s Day, Leanne has a clear message for NRL boss Todd Greenberg.

‘‘My son deserves another shot,’’ she said. ‘‘I’m not angry at all with the NRL or Todd Greenberg because I know Todd has had his chances. But he has learnt and he is prepared to do what it takes to make it back and make it good and make it right.

"I don’t quite understand why Matt Lodge is allowed to play for Brisbane and Todd still has to prove himself to everyone, and that he is still called a ‘bad boy’ every time that his name is mentioned by anyone.

"He has been silly, but he has never hurt anyone except himself. Ihad to live through the whole thing with the incident in the bathroom. It was silly and he regrets it. I think if there is one thing I’d like to say to Todd Greenberg is that he has been punished enough and that he is desperate to play again.’’

It’s official: The Butler did it

It is not surprising that there is tension among our match officials.

In the past few weeks there have been some poor decisions with no one keen to take the blame. The most notable was Billy Slater’s “try” against Brisbane where he knocked on but the on-field referee and bunker ruled he had drop-kicked the ball and regathered.

Slater gave himself up and indicated he had dropped the ball.

Referee Ashley Klein, who awarded the try, and Jared Maxwell, who was in the bunker, have borne the brunt of the criticism. But it was the “football expert”, Luke Patten, who determined the try should stand. Patten escaped scrutiny, while his colleagues were torn apart.

Last weekend, Matt Cecchin was the primary target of abuse after a late call robbed Josh Addo-Carr of one of the tries of the season. It was actually his pocket referee, Chris Butler, who ruled there should be a penalty to the Storm in the play-the-ball and the try was disallowed.

Butler emerged unscathed, while Cecchin copped the blame. No surprise that Cecchin had a new assistant ref, Jon Stone, for yesterday’s Warriors-Roosters clash.

A Roo tale

It has been fascinating to follow the Twitter exchange in recent weeks between Andrew Voss, the host of Fox Sports’ TheFan, and American actor John Cusack.

This all started when Vossy ran a piece on his show asking how it was that Cusack wore an Australian rugby league jersey (believed to be the genuine article, pictured right) in his 1985 film The Sure Thing.

The movie has absolutely nothing to do with league, or Australia, for that matter.

So a social media campaign of sorts was started to attempt to contact Cusack, director Rob Reiner or the costume department from the film.

John Cusack in The Sure Thing.

Viewers of The Fan jumped on board to help out. Even Australian Rugby League Commission board member Professor Megan Davis tweeted that NRL chief executive Todd Greenberg needed to get involved.

Heaven knows what Cusack must have thought at this sudden and peculiar interest from Down Under in a movie he appeared in 33 years ago.

For the past two weeks, Cusack would have been receiving hundreds of tweets. Fans pleaded for a response.

One fan even posted a photo from Henson Park last Saturday asking if the man on the hill in the Aussie jersey was, in fact, Cusack?

In the early hours of Wednesday morning, Cusack, a prolific tweeter in the US, finally relented.

He responded with a simple message: ‘‘Nope I knew nothing except it was a rugby shirt. Random choice. :)’’

The better answer to the mystery came from the movie’s costume designer, Durinda Wood, who told one of The Fan’s viewers, Pat McKenna: ‘‘Yes I remember that jersey. I think I got it at a Salvation Army store. I liked how thick and well made it was. I liked the colouring of it and the emblem on it. John really liked it and it just worked when we tried it on in the fitting.’’

The original owner of the jersey remains a mystery. But it’s possible it was worn by a genuine Australian international. Can anyone solve the mystery?

Taxing times

This column misses the days of budget headlines screaming “Beer and cigs up”. And despite starting, and never finishing a commerce degree, normally I have no interest in the budget.

However, we received a note from taxation specialists Greg Willett and Ben Johnston, who look after the affairs of many of Australia’s top athletes. They are concerned about changes in the budget.

Their message is twofold: offers from English and French rugby and league teams are suddenly going to be more appealing; and athletes will need to review existing contracts and consider these changes when entering into new deals.

As it stands, athletes can license their image and marketing rights to related entities, such as companies and trusts, that they own and who in turn can enter into endorsements on behalf of the athlete. This is common and can result in big tax savings.

In the budget, the federal government announced that from July 1 these arrangements will no longer be allowed and that athlete will be taxed on the earnings derived from these marketing rights agreements as individual earnings.

What does all this mean? That elite athletes will be taxed at a much higher rate on the earnings they derive from marketing agreements. This will particularly impact sports such as surfing, golf and tennis where athletes are earning huge sums of money through marketing arrangements where brands use their name and image to sell products.

These changes also impact team sports, including Australia’s major football codes, whose players also receive endorsement deals over and above club payments.

For many sportspeople, income from these deals far outweighs the earnings from prizemoney, therefore these changes could have a profound impact.

These changes could tempt Australia’s athletes to take up residency in a country that has more favourable tax arrangements.

Spotted

Former Swans star Adam Goodes supporting the NRL’s Indigenous Round at Leichhardt Oval on Thursday night. Injured Panthers half Nathan Cleary was also there, supporting his dad.

And we bumped into a relaxed Damian Keogh in Cronulla. His days of hiding out after his inglorious exit from the Sharks appear to be a thing of the past.