LONDON — Former England striker Andy Carroll has revealed he was sexually assaulted by a man at his home in 2021 during his second spell with hometown club Newcastle United, an incident that led to the perpetrator being jailed for three years and which he has now made public in his autobiography 'Owning it'.
Carroll, 37, said the attacker was a friend of his former partner who had come to his home to watch a boxing match and was set to stay over while his partner was away. He said the assault occurred while he was sleeping, after which he threw the man out of the house and knocked him unconscious as the man tried to return, then called the police and was left "sobbing" in the arms of his children's nanny. The unnamed attacker was later found guilty of sexual offences, placed on the sex offender register and sentenced to three years in prison, with Carroll testifying in court in a process he described as "humiliating and embarrassing and absolutely horrendous".
Carroll, who was automatically granted anonymity as a victim of sexual assault, said he decided to include the incident "at the very last minute" after discussing it with his girlfriend Lou Teasdale. "I was sexually assaulted, there I said it. Scary to even think about and only a few people knew about it before now," he wrote. "Me and Lou spent a lot of time discussing whether to mention it in this book or not. I avoided my publisher for so long that they probably suspected I got cold feet." He added: "Scary to talk about but it's made [me] the person I am today as much as any of the good stuff. And if me talking about it helps just one person then good, it will have been worth it."
Carroll, who won nine England caps and also played in the Premier League for Liverpool and West Ham as well as for Reading, West Brom and French sides Amiens and Bordeaux, said the trauma continues to affect him. "What happened to me affected every facet of my life. I'd think about it every day, making it difficult to focus on anything else, including football… The trauma of what happened to me hasn't gone away," he wrote. Now player/co-owner of non-league club Dagenham & Redbridge after joining in July 2025, he has made six appearances in the National League South this season.