2024 Rewind: Rugby Star Tom Garratt Has Fun Responding to Hot Takes on His Hot Video

This piece is part of EDGE's 2024 Rewind series. We're reaching into our archives and sharing some of our favorite stories from the past year.

After initially claiming that an explicit video of him and another man was a deepfake, rugby champ Tom Garratt leaned into the moment and mocked the shocked responses some people had to the clip with several TikTok posts addressing the leaked footage.

The video showed Garratt in an intimate situation with another man and sparked online discussion (some of it homophobic). Garratt explained on his sports podcast Pitchside that the video was made seven years ago, when he would have been 22 years old, and that he was on vacation. Things "got a bit messy" on the evening the clip was made, he said, "and we thought it would be funny to... yeah."

@yourdailyclips314 Tom Garratt address the Video!! #podcastclips #storytime #podcast #pitchside #pitchsidepodcast #tomgarratt ♬ original sound - BetterWalmart

Garratt went on to say, "We had a great time, we had a great laugh and I don't know how the video's got out but it has."

The rugby star wasn't shy about embracing the same-sex nature of the moment. Saying in another TikTok post that the video "doesn't mean I'm bi, it doesn't mean I'm gay," the pro athlete-turned-influencer quickly backtracked to add: "Well, maybe it does. And if I am, I am!"

"If you're not comfortable with a cock in your face, or a cock in your hand, there's something wrong with you, all right?" he continued.

He also jokingly copped to "being a bit fruity," and declared that the video was an example of youthful hijinks – though, he also said, the other man in the video "was a friend in need, and I am a friend indeed. He needed a helping hand!"

@tgarratt02 Apparently theres an AI video going round about me...
♬ original sound - Tom Garratt

In a TikTok video in which he said he would "react to the reactions," Garratt made fun of one pundit who complained that he couldn't "unsee" the graphic footage of Garratt and the other man. "I tossed me mate off [while drunk] seven years ago," Garratt said. "I haven't committed a war crime..."

Mocking the man's outpouring of shock, Garratt went on to ask, "Why did you watch it then?" before pointing out that the man must have watched for at least half a minute.

@tgarratt02 Reacting to the reactions of me...
♬ original sound - Tom Garratt

To another online reaction he declared, "That is more homosexual than sucking your mate off!"

Garratt noted that no one seemed to have a similar problem with another "icon of British football," Paul Gascoigne, having said that he would touch a teammate in an intimate manner before matches for luck. "I'm just saying this shit goes on. Maybe it shouldn't be all over the internet, and I agree with that. Just let people live!"

One person posted that he and his friends had gathered in a hot tub to watch the video multiple times. "I can't work out if he's always trolling, or he's just mental," Garratt told his viewers.

Garratt denounced the homophobia in some of the comments on the video. "Look, the bottom line is: Get over it. And I'm serious now, the homophobia that has come out from this is fucking mad. How people are so comfortable being so publicly homophobic is mad. What if I was gay? Who gives a fuck? What would you care if I like sucking cock?"

Noting that he had never intended for the video to get online or go viral, Garratt took on another talking point: "But Tom, you shouldn't have done it in the first place and had it recorded!" To that he responded: "Well, I'm a weirdo. Me and my mates are weirdos."

Garratt went on to call online response to the video "an overreaction beyond belief."

"If you're not comfortable with a cock in your face, then that's a you issue!" he declared.

Clearly more bothered by the "hack" that led to the video's release than by the content of the clip, Garratt summarized the situation neatly with the words: "This shit goes on."

But he also offered a tantalizing tidbit in saying, "if anyone's looking for a holiday buddy for the summer, I might be going to Tenerife. I'll see you there!"