Josh vehemently defends himself here and his innocence in this matter that as far as he's concerned he's done nothing wrong that he's taken no drugs and he can't understand why he tested positive once at the scene of this roadside test on Friday night however putting the club first and the team first Josh has made the decision to stand down from this week's game not make himself available so the team can get on with its preparation what a bizarre situation Bulldog's Marquee player Josh adocar has sensationally stood himself down after a failed roadside drug test joining me to explain is sports editor at the nightly Ben mclen so Ben can you give us some background to this situation on the eve of the club's elimination final a blockbuster game against Manley this Sunday can's you know greatly anticipated return to the final series it's their first Final in nearly a decade so obviously a lot of a lot of hype around this and this has sort of really just sucked all the oxygen out of the room in regards to their preparation so so what's happened is um yesterday morning Phil Gould um who you just heard the audio over there the football boss at Canterbury he put out a tweet uh to address rumors about Josh Odo car having been involved in some sort of incident and testing positive and saying no Josh Josh tested negative he told us that there's no story here then subsequently it was revealed um in a statement by New South Wales police that um on Friday night they pulled over a 29y old who was Josh adocar um in a suburb um in sort of Western Sydney or in between Western Sydney and then a West uh Wentworth par Point uh just near Olympic Park which is where the Bulldogs uh were training in preparation for Saturday night's game um he was drug tested it's unclear if he was breath tested which is sort of a mute point here but he was drug tested and the police have said that he came up with a positive test um which was not what canb um had initially said based on what Josh adakara told them there was a second test these are saliva tests um as I understand it that was inconclusive um and then police and New South Wales have yet to clarify this Josh adok car was then allowed to leave the scene despite allegedly having a positive cocaine test now there's been some reporting that that's because the officers who pulled him over were called to a more urgent job and so because one of the tests um wasn't you know both tests weren't positive uh they they essentially let him go um now that obviously caused a massive bombshell that an NRL star days out from a big final had tested positive to cocaine um and so there's been a lot of pressure on Canter a lot of crisis meetings Gus met with Josh um and I feel strongly that Josh's decision to stand down was heavily influenced by Gus Gould who essentially said to him that if you were to continue playing and there's actually no framework for them to stand him down because he hasn't actually been charge with anything um that it would just create a circus which which of course is entirely accurate so so car isn't going to play um in Sunday's gaming it's Manley we've now leared that this this second test which was inconclusive is going to take 10 weeks 10 weeks possibly to come back with the result what kind of test takes 10 weeks I'm I'm not sure I am a sports editor I was once a crime reporter but um but yeah so we we are seeking more clarity around this um so this could potentially hang over at oar's head for two and a half months which I don't think is going to happen um yeah and there is you know as Donald ramsfeld once said there's a lot of unknown unknowns in this story but we do know some things and that is that Josh Adar had a provisional um test for cocaine and I just want to you know put in the legal disclaimer that he hasn't been charged with anything um um so therefore he has the presumption of innocence he's denying it he's saying he didn't take any drugs he's engaged lawyers um so this is going to get pretty interesting and I imagine pretty ugly because the police are going to have to come out and clarify what exactly they're doing yeah there's two things about this story that I don't understand the first so he was apparently the driver of a Toyota hatchback yes and this is a BL who earns 500 Grand a year at least he's he's rolling in a Toyota hatchback that doesn't make any sense to me secondly the other thing that doesn't make any sense if indeed Gus Gould has you know given him the quiet word do the do the righty by the team y I don't know if that's such good advice because surely we've seen over and over again in rugby league that in situations like this uh you circle the wagons you know go everyone's against us and use it as fuel use it as motivation and we've seen time and time again in these situations teams Come Out Swinging when they feel that the world is against I that is a very good point and and his teammates would feel like he's been hung out to dry so that is a very good point I think the way caner looks at it you know and this is this is not Gus G's first radio right he you know he knows he knows how to run a football club you know he's been credited with being chiefly responsible for for bringing Canterbury out of the doldrums into uh one of their best CRS have form in many many years um is that if they were to stick by car and then something was to come out on Thursday or Friday that meant they had to not let him play like police charged him with a with a drug driving offense then that would probably create even more chaos so by him standing down now um they bring in another player to take his spot they know what the team's going to be there'll obviously be a lot of white noise but those players can focus on the game at hand and um you know Les we talk about the actual you know ball on the field Canterbury coming off two massive losses in their last two rounds they've been um hailed as one of the great defensive teams in NRL with only letting in an average of 16 points a game that's gone completely out the window um and so they need to get their their team back on track for this Sudden Death final um against Manley out at a COR stadium homebush and I think rightly so having Josh still in the team it would just be I mean it is still going to be but it would be even more so the constant story every day every time a canary player gets up they'd get asked about it again that's probably still going to happen but at least the players can say look he's not playing so let's move on and talk about something else so yeah look it's it's a really interesting uh story um it's it's not quite the same as the LOL Mitchell white powder photo I mean he was pictured with a white powder again there was no police involvement in that he was banned for a week for bringing the game into disrepute so it will be interesting what comes out of this because there is a possibility because the N Integrity unit's looking at this is they could potentially take some action based on what the police tell them um so that's very interesting other thing when you're listening to Gus G's comments is I think what's what's also um not pleased Gus was he feels like he wasn't told the whole truth so Josh told the club straight away Saturday morning which is the right thing for him to have done in Years Gone by and players would have been the last thing they would have done they just would hoped it all would have gone away like a child he did tell the club that he said look I got pulled over they tested me nothing happened it's all good right and then the club believed him and then that subsequently doesn't appear to be the case so it appears like Gus G has made comments today that he's convinced um Josh you know didn't sort of intend to lie to him um and but um he he didn't feel like he was told the whole truth so so that's I think that's part of this decision as as well that there are some question marks with the club over ad Oar who's obviously you know played for Australia played for New South Wales um he's you know one of the Strike weapons of canbury so they will sely miss him and they'll miss his experience because he's played in big games before and a lot of their young Squad hasn't yeah well let's revisit this decision on Monday and see uh what the result of this big Blockbuster elimination final was Sports edit to the nightly Ben mcclelen great to have you on the show thank you [Music] he [Music]