In the east London orbit of Dagenham & Redbridge, where Andy Carroll now combines a playing role with co-ownership of a National League South club, the former England forward has disclosed the most painful episode of his life in a new autobiography. Carroll, 37, says he was sexually assaulted in 2021 by a man known to his former partner, who was later convicted of sexual offences and sentenced to three years in prison.
The former Newcastle United and Liverpool striker recounts the experience in Owning It, saying he added the account only near the end of the publishing process after extensive discussions with his publisher and his current partner, Lou Teasdale.
A night after a Newcastle match
Carroll writes that the incident followed a match during his second spell at Newcastle. The man came to the home Carroll shared with his then partner and prepared drinks in the kitchen. Carroll says he became dizzy and wondered whether something had been put into his drink.
The visitor asked to use the spare room for the night. Carroll says that, after going to bed himself, he woke to find the man under the duvet attempting to perform a sexual act on him.
“I was sexually assaulted,” Carroll writes. He says he struck the man, removed him from the house and called both police and the family’s nanny.
When officers arrived, the man had regained consciousness and alleged that Carroll had attacked him without reason. Both men were taken to a police station. The man was subsequently found guilty of sexual offences, received a three-year custodial sentence, was placed on the sex offenders register and barred from entering the village where Carroll lived.
Two-year legal ordeal
Carroll describes the court process as humiliating, shameful and “absolutely horrible”. He says the man denied the allegations throughout a case that lasted two years.
Only his then partner and her family knew of the assault while proceedings were under way, Carroll says. He recalls crying uncontrollably when police informed him that the man had been convicted.
The trauma has not disappeared, he writes, and at times affected his ability to focus on football. Carroll and Teasdale decided that publishing his account could offer support to others who have undergone comparable experiences.
“If speaking about it helps even one person, it will have been worth it,” Carroll writes.
From record Liverpool signing to Dagenham
Carroll’s career has carried him from the northeast to France and back through English football’s divisions. Liverpool signed him from Newcastle in 2011 as the replacement for Fernando Torres, who had joined Chelsea. The €41 million fee was a club-record outlay for Liverpool at the time.
Injuries prevented him from establishing himself at Anfield. His later clubs included West Ham United, Newcastle for a second spell, Reading, West Bromwich Albion, Amiens and Bordeaux before his move to Dagenham & Redbridge, who compete in England’s sixth tier.
In the book, Carroll also addresses difficulties with alcohol and the effect on his career of earning as much as £200,000 per week, a sum put at about €233,000.
Separately, he has pleaded not guilty to an allegation that he breached a restraining order by repeatedly calling his former partner, reality television personality Billi Mucklow. That trial is scheduled for January.
