Josh Addo-Carr faces two-hour grilling as footy bosses ask under-fire winger what exactly happened following positive cocaine tests

Josh Addo-Carr faced the music on Thursday afternoon as the under-fire Canterbury star faced a two-hour grilling over his positive cocaine tests.

Addo-Carr was at Rugby League Central to explain the circumstances that led to a positive result to cocaine following a roadside drugs test taken earlier this month.

The premiership winger has maintained his innocence following the incident, but accepted a $682 fine and a three-month driving suspension. 

He says he copped the fine and driving ban to save his family and club from negative public attention.

The Bulldogs winger attended the meeting with his manager Mario Tartak and lawyer Nick Ghabar – a regular visitor to Rugby League Central given his reputation as the go-to lawyer for players.

‘He maintains that he did not take anything,’ Ghabar told the Sydney Morning Herald after the meeting.  

The SMH reports that Addo-Carr told the NRL that he did not receive a docket from police with a serial number for his first test, and was mailed said docket a week later.

The winger’s Canterbury future is in the balance after Phil Gould’s comments this week

Addo-Carr also claims there to be conjecture over whether his first test was ‘conclusive’. His decision to accept the police penalty ends the matter from a criminal perspective, however.

The NRL is expected to sanction the NSW Blues star who stood himself down from the finals defeat by Manly, while his future at Canterbury is clouded by uncertainty.

Phil Gould, the club’s general manager, said the player’s version of events contained ‘too many contradictions’ but said he would wait for the outcome of the NRL investigation before deciding the forthcoming steps. 

‘At the end of the day what we have is a positive drug test, that there were drugs in his system last Friday night,’ Gould said on his Six Tackles with Gus podcast.

‘I believe he’s still protesting his innocence in that. But at [some stage] he’s going to have to explain to himself and explain to people that matter exactly how that’s happened and why it’s happened.

‘And then why we’ve gone through what we’ve gone through over the last week or so with that. It was certainly bad timing.’