But a News Corp report which claimed Williams sent a text message to the club welfare manager to inform the Raiders he would not be attending regulation training has been refuted by the star.<\/p>\n
Williams also slammed suggestions he agitated Canberra CEO Don Furner and coach Ricky Stuart into granting him an immediate release, re-stating he only requested a release for season's end weeks ago.<\/p>\n
https:\/\/twitter.com\/George7Williams\/status\/1397107917006860291<\/a><\/p>\n In a club statement released earlier today, Furner said the club had little decision but to release Williams immediately considering the seriousness of his situation.<\/p>\n "George and his partner have asked on a number of occasions for a release to return to England to be closer to their families and we've decided to grant their request," Furner said.<\/p>\n "George withdrew from training today and from the game this weekend which highlighted to the Club the seriousness of George's request.<\/p>\n "Over the past several weeks we have supported George and provided him with the best welfare support we could, however as a Club we felt that his position at the club moving forward became untenable."<\/p>\n With his partner expecting their first child, the England star reportedly approached coach Ricky Stuart in April about seeking an early exit from his deal.<\/p>\n The Raiders had hoped to find a like-for-like replacement before releasing Williams.<\/p>\n But having arrived in Canberra weeks before the last year's pandemic, Williams had been unable to see family, leading to a bout of homesickness that reached boiling point.<\/p>\n Williams fast became the cornerstone of Stuart's playmaking stocks with an ability to organise, ball-play and marshall his troops around the paddock.<\/p>\n It's just the latest setback for Ricky's Raiders who have endured a torrid 2021 campaign, slumping to 11th on the ladder.<\/p>\n 30-year-old Sam Williams will likely be their halfback for the rest of the season.<\/p>\n For a daily dose of the best of the breaking news and exclusive content from Wide World of Sports, subscribe to our newsletter by<\/strong><\/em> clicking here!<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Star England import George Williams has returned serve over reports he agitated the Raiders into an immediate release from his playing contract via text. Williams […]<\/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\/75779"}],"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=75779"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75779\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":75781,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75779\/revisions\/75781"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=75779"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=75779"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=75779"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n