Greater Western Sydney captain Toby Greene has revealed he punched his father in the rooms after a game, embarrassed by his drunken behaviour.
Greene made the revelation in the first episode of the Amazon Prime Video series Final Siren: Inside the AFL where he details his troubled relationship with his estranged father Michael Greene.
GWS star Toby Greene.Credit: AFL Photos
Greene’s father was jailed for nine months, reduced on appeal, for assaulting a female police officer while watching his son’s Giants heavy loss to Richmond in the 2019 grand final.
The Giants star’s dressing room confrontation with his father came earlier in his career.
“I knocked him out in the change rooms because he was drunk and carrying on,” Greene said in the series, which premiered on Wednesday night.
“He’s pretty loud and boisterous and he’s extremely drunk. And I was just embarrassed and just told him to f— off and punched him. So, yeah, it’s hard.
“Like the reason I love footy is because of him and got into it. That’s what I’ll take with me, and then you learn your lessons from some things that he’s done that you can’t do.”
Greene spoke publicly in 2020 about his father’s troubles in The Phil Davis Podcast, hosted by former GWS captain Phil Davis, saying his father had a “profound impact” on his career but “some of the stuff outside of that left a bit to be desired”. He was more candid in the series.
“Ten, 15 years drinking alcohol and drugs probably taken a fair toll on his body and brain,” Greene said.
Greene is among the best players of his generation but has an extensive tribunal rap sheet, racking up $47,850 in fines in his 14-season career. He has also been rubbed out for 16 games, his most recent suspension coming in last year’s Sydney Derby in July.
The series shows a conversation between Greene and his wife Georgia Stirton in the days after the derby, where the player is berated for what he describes as his latest “brain fart”.
Stirton outlined the impact the player’s poor on-field discipline had on their family, saying it led to online abuse from trolls.
“People are saying ‘I hope family members die’ or ‘you should kill yourself’,” Stirton said in the documentary.
“Or I have a DM saying, ‘You know, I saw him cheating with girls’ and ‘Has he bashed you up?’
“It probably affects me more than Toby.”
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