{"id":6440,"date":"2020-12-07T04:37:39","date_gmt":"2020-12-07T05:37:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=6440"},"modified":"2020-12-07T10:17:18","modified_gmt":"2020-12-07T10:17:18","slug":"stuart-defends-character-of-arrested-star","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=6440","title":{"rendered":"Stuart defends character of arrested star"},"content":{"rendered":"

Canberra Raiders coach Ricky Stuart has defended the character of rising star Tom Starling, who has been charged with assaulting police during a brawl outside a bar on NSW's Central Coast.<\/a><\/p>\n

The 22-year-old, who has nasty facial cuts from the melee, is facing a total of seven charges, including five counts of assaulting an officer in execution of duty.<\/p>\n

Starling claims he was trying to break up an altercation between his brother and another patron after an insulting comment was made about their mother.<\/p>\n

The promising hooker was with his siblings and parents celebrating a 21st birthday at Shady Palms restaurant in Kincumber.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

The riot squad was needed to help break up the fight.<\/p>\n

"It is disappointing but I have spoken to Tom at length yesterday and I know a number of our club officials have spoken to Tommy," Stuart said at a press conference on Monday.<\/p>\n

"Speaking to Tom, defending his mother and brother is something I was obviously OK with.<\/p>\n

"If he didn't jump in to defend his brother and mother I'd probably be more disappointed in the guy.<\/p>\n

"His version of events is a lot different to what's been publicly stated.<\/p>\n

\"Tom<\/p>\n

"If his version of events is truthful, which I've no doubt it would be, because he's not a guy who's going to lie to me.<\/p>\n

"I only spoke to him via phone but he was shaken up and disappointed \u2013 it's not in his nature."<\/p>\n

Starling has been granted bail and will face court in January.<\/p>\n

Police allege Starling grabbed at an officer's pistol during the fight – a highly serious charge which surprised Stuart.<\/p>\n

"The point today that's out there \u2013 reaching for an officer's gun \u2013 no one in their right mind would do that," Stuart said.<\/p>\n

\"Ricky<\/p>\n

"Highly unlikely Tom would.<\/p>\n

"I certainly hope that isn't the case."<\/p>\n

Stuart and the Raiders went through a similar situation this year with centre Curtis Scott<\/a>, whose charges of assaulting police were eventually dropped.<\/p>\n

"I'm all about the game too, and there's been headlines over the last month or six weeks that haven't been good for our game and hopefully it can be put to bed very quickly," Stuart said.<\/p>\n

"I thought we did a good job of (handling Scott's case) as a club.<\/p>\n

"It affected Curtis last year.<\/p>\n

"The drag on of the court system and just the embarrassment of it.<\/p>\n

\"Tom<\/p>\n

"I hope it doesn't drag on again this year for Tommy's sake.<\/p>\n

"We will certainly support Tommy going on what he told me yesterday and his version of events, telling me the truth which I asked for.<\/p>\n

"It'll be interesting to see how it plays out."<\/p>\n

The NRL is conducting its own investigation.<\/p>\n

NRL players Kalyn Ponga and Jack Johns, who were at the function but not involved in the brawl, are expected to be questioned by the NRL's integrity unit.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Canberra Raiders coach Ricky Stuart has defended the character of rising star Tom Starling, who has been charged with assaulting police during a brawl outside […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6440"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6440"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6440\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6442,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6440\/revisions\/6442"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6440"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6440"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6440"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}