- Willie Mason has had his say on the Paul Kent incident
- 54-year-old Kent was involved in a street fight on Saturday
- Mason condemned the expert for acting like an 18-year-old
Willie Mason has criticized Paul Kent for ‘acting like he’s 18’ after giving his response to the ‘hilarious’ footage that went viral this weekend.
The Fox Sports commentator was suspended from his role on NRL360 on Sunday after footage showed 54-year-old Kent fighting with a younger man outside upscale Rozelle venue Totti’s in inner Sydney on Saturday evening.
Kent, who was previously fired by the broadcaster nine months after being accused of assaulting and strangling his ex-girlfriend, had only been reinstated as co-host of the show in February after being acquitted by the court.
A 35-year-old man was charged on Sunday as the police investigation into the incident continued.
Mason has added his name to a number of prominent footy figures to comment on the episode, which he described as ‘hilarious’.
Willie Mason calls Paul Kent’s video ‘hilarious’
Kent, 54, was involved in a street fight in Sydney on Saturday evening
“Imagine waking up to that s*** and just saying, ‘What just happened?'” he said on his Levels podcast.
‘You think you just came out of a nightmare. You would see your phone blow up.
“This is damned. That’s what you expect from an 18-year-old at a festival. Not a 50 year old man that is common on TV.
“That’s damned. It’s hilarious, I thought it was hilarious. He tried to do a cartwheel on the stump of a tree. He got a hip toss.”
“Can you believe that happened? This man is 50 years old. At least win the damn fight.”
In the aftermath of Saturday night’s alleged incident, Kent was visited by his friend John Elias and four others at his home in Lilyfield in Sydney’s inner west on Sunday morning. – just moments after news broke that the journalist had been suspended.
Elias, 60, is a former professional rugby league footballer and coach who played for clubs in Sydney, Brisbane, England and France in the 1980s and 1990s.
Rugby great Mason has slammed Kent, 54, for ‘acting like he was 18’
Throughout his career he played for many teams including the South Sydney Rabbitohs, Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs, Western Suburbs Magpies, Eastern Suburbs Roosters and Balmain Tigers.
However, he began leading a double life by turning to crime off the field, which led to him being jailed several times, including for firearms and drug offences.
He was jailed for nine months in 1995 after pleading guilty in the NSW District Court to two charges of supplying amphetamines and spent four years in prison after a jury found him guilty in 2004 of shooting a man in his leg.
Elias was also given a suspended sentence in 2014 after being found guilty of threatening a confectionery seller by calling him to warn that ‘there will be consequences’ if Cadbury Schweppes did not give its employees a ‘good deal’.