He’s been exposed’: Buzz’s stinging reply to Gus as ‘complete c**p’ claim called out
He’s been exposed’: Buzz’s stinging reply to Gus as ‘complete c**p’ claim called out
Speaking on 100% Footy on Monday night, Gould came out all guns blazing, slamming the report and also delivering a scathing attack on respected journalist Michael Chammas.
But Rothfield has now had his say and explained how the story came about on Fox League’s NRL 360 on Tuesday night.
“It was absolutely no attempt to destabilise Canterbury, Gus is doing a pretty good job of that himself, look at the premiership ladder,” Rothfield said.
“He’s on eight, nine hundred thousand a year. He might tell you they aren’t going backwards but last season they were in 12th, not in 15th.
“I worked on this all weekend… two Sydney clubs told me over the weekend they’d pulled out of the race for Tino because they couldn’t beat Canterbury.
“They were offering a million a year, and an investment opportunity and a money-back guarantee with the Bulldogs.
“I spoke to Tino’s manager, Simon Mammino who confirmed there was interest from the Bulldogs, there was a meeting that was going to take place.
“Next thing I have to confirm the pub side of the story… I also spoke to a couple of other agents to get a better understanding of how the Melbourne Storm investment with Betr works and how this could possibly work.
“My last job on Sunday was to ring Arthur Laundy himself, the boss of Laundy Hotels, a billionaire and major sponsor of the Bulldogs.
“We had a 10-minute conversation, he took me through it blow by blow how he was going to achieve this. How Canterbury were so low down on the ladder that they have got to pay overs to get players.”
Gould made a sweeping declaration he had “never spoken to Tino” and labelled Rothfield’s story “childish”
“He (Laundy) is in there trying to help them, Gus has blown up because his club has been exposed for an obvious attempt to rort the cap,” Rothfield said.
“He’s been exposed, he’s been caught out with it.
“... I thanked him [Laundy] and I said, ‘Mate this is a really good column for Monday’... but 10 minutes later he actually rang me back,” Rothfield revealed.
“He said, ‘Buzz can I actually change one of my quotes, I’m not comfortable saying that’. I then read him back every quote that was to appear in the column. So what Gus said, that this was a private conversation and not designed to go into the newspaper is complete crap.”
NRL360 host Braith Anasta also said: “He (Gould) made out like you tricked Arthur in to the article”.
Rothfield then made the huge claim he would happily sit down with Gould in a courtroom to settle whether or not the story was fabricated.
He also revealed the penalty the Bulldogs could have been facing if the NRL didn’t step in to block the mammoth contract offer.