I was dismayed to read Paul Crawley’s article in The Daily Telegraph. I can’t dispute what was in the article as I was not there to witness what happened.
ARTICLE: HAS HAYNE ALREADY MADE THE 49ERS’ 53-MAN ROSTER?
If you haven’t read it, the accusation is that Paul Gallen swore in the vicinity of some young Cronulla fans who wanted his autograph.
“Then he said, ‘F*** this, I haven’t got time for this s***’,” Gallen is quoted in the article as saying when around the kids.
What I would like to do is recount something I witnessed, in regards to Paul Gallen’s attitude and approach to young fans.
I was at the Sharks versus Titans game earlier this year at Remondis, to watch my young bloke play a demonstration game prior to first grade.
Once that was complete, the first grade team came out to warm-up. A number of the juniors who had just played the demo game, got to create a guard of honour for the players to run through and high five the first graders as they ran on.
To say that the juniors were tickled pink to be able to do this would be an understatement.
Paul Gallen was one of the last to run out. He high-fived the juniors as he came out, and the last junior in the guard was so excited that he leapt up and missed Gallen’s hand. The disappointment on the young bloke’s face was extreme and he started walking back to his seat on the sideline.
What he didn’t notice, as he walked back, was that Gallen had noticed he missed his high five, and had gone to his knees and called him back ready for another attempt. Gallen stayed there and called back to the junior repeatedly until he got his attention, and came running back to gleefully high five his hero.
Paul Gallen didn’t have to do that. I certainly expected him to give up after he called the kid back a couple of times, but he didn’t. He stayed until he got the young bloke’s attention so he didn’t miss out. And he went up in my estimations 10 fold.
Gallen’s battle with anxiety or depression has been well documented. These things happen after sustained periods of stress.
If something did happen along the lines of Crawley’s story, or a variation of it, I’d like to imagine that we can all understand that nothing in life is completely black or white.
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