The mother of Maddy Cusack told an inquest it is too difficult for women footballers to report grievances, for fear of being blacklisted, and said her daughter would still be alive if “her nemesis” Jonathan Morgan had not been appointed as Sheffield United’s manager.
Deborah Cusack said Morgan, who is scheduled to give evidence at Cusack’s inquest on Monday, made her daughter “feel as if she had to give up football”, prior to her being found dead at the family’s home in Derbyshire on 20 September 2023. Thursday’s hearing also heard there had been an “industrial-scale” loss of players’ sensitive medical data involving the records-keeping system used for women’s footballers at multiple clubs, including missing records for Cusack. The club’s doctor at the time, Subhashis Basu, admitted that he had failed to adequately report the data breach.
Deborah Cusack also told Chesterfield coroner’s court that her daughter had asked Dr Basu for a referral to a counsellor two weeks prior to her death but that he had advised doing so “further down the line”. Responding to that claim, Dr Basu disagreed with that recollection, saying: “I essentially said ‘I can get in touch with Sporting Chance if you want me to’.”
Describing Maddy Cusack as a “happy and bright soul with a beautiful smile” and a “fun-loving daughter” who was “the heart of our family”, Deborah Cusack said her daughter had “never ever” had any mental health problems prior to Morgan’s appointment as Sheffield United’s manager in February 2023. However, she also told Morgan “I’m not blaming you for exactly what she did,” before adding: “But you made her feel how she felt. It was the little knocks every now and again. You cut her down to size. If you hadn’t been employed, my daughter would be here today.”
Deborah Cusack was also critical of the Professional Footballers’ Association (PFA) and the Football Association (FA), saying the PFA had not checked in on Maddy Cusack despite her being a PFA member, while another player raised a separate grievance during Maddy’s time at Sheffield United. Deborah Cusack said: “They should have checked in on any other members at the club. Perhaps they need to be a little more aware of the differences between men’s and women’s [football].
“Organisations such as the FA have the Integrity phone line [a confidential reporting service], but I know no girl will ring it. It is quite difficult to raise a grievance because you feel you’re going to be blacklisted or labelled as a trouble-maker. Maddy felt she couldn’t speak to the hierarchy at Sheffield. That really needs to change.”
Deborah Cusack also said Morgan had upset Maddy Cusack by calling her “bottom-heavy” – something Morgan, who is representing himself, claimed was a reference to her muscles and a strength-and-conditioning regime – and that her daughter had felt “humiliated beyond belief” when Morgan called Maddy Cusack’s girlfriend Grace Riglar “Mrs Cusack” in front of the team. Visibly furious while directing this comment to Morgan, Deborah Cusack asked: “Who are you to give rules when you yourself had a relationship with a player?”
Deborah Cusack took her daughter to see her GP, Mobeen Bhatti, who gave evidence on Monday, on 6 September 2023 and, shortly afterwards, her daughter called Dr Basu to inform him why she would not be going to training. Dr Basu was severely scrutinised by the coroner during Thursday’s hearing over the missing medical records, which he said affected lots of players in addition to Cusack, and had still not been resolved when he left the club in the summer of 2024. He now works as Rotherham United’s club doctor and as the English Football League’s medical director.
Medical records have been repeatedly discussed during the inquest because the Cusack family allege Morgan dropped Maddy Cusack for his first match in charge without just cause, whereas Morgan and the club’s former physio, Francesca Carr, have said Cusack was injured. Her full medical notes for that period cannot be located.
Dr Basu said extensive player medical records went missing during a transition from using Kitman Labs to WPS as the logging system during the summer of 2023, telling the court: “There were systematic widespread issues with this electronic records system. I contacted the records provider directly regarding this on multiple occasions”. But he conceded he had failed to report this to the club until after Cusack’s death, and he had not informed the information commissioner. Additionally, he mentioned the data loss to neither the club’s nor the FA’s investigations into Cusack’s death. The coroner subsequently expressed concern that other players’ medical data may still be unaccounted for.
Dr Basu was also questioned about a request he made to the Cusack family a day after Maddy Cusack’s death – which he said was on behalf of the head of brain health at the PFA – to allow the PFA to use her brain for research into the impact of heading, a request which the family refused.
David Cusack, Maddy’s father, had told the court on Monday that Dr Basu had said later during that phone call on 21 September 2023 that he had spoken to Maddy five days before her death, but on Thursday Basu insisted he had not spoken to Maddy at all after 6 September 2023, saying: “I can only presume that was a misunderstanding. I genuinely did not speak with her on that day. If I had, and she had presented with [that] state, I would have helped her. If I’ve contributed to that misunderstanding then I sincerely apologise to the family.”
The inquest continues on Friday.
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