I genuinely can't believe the lack of comprehension from so many people in this thread. For Benji to be horrified by something, he doesn't need to say those words, as a matter of fact facial reactions are a lot more accurate in these situations.
Any single person in that gym could have been watching Benji shake his head in disbelief (or something similar) after watching Milf skip a set and then report that to Kent.
And at no point did Kent indicate he spoke to Benji, you're just twisting it that way because your comprehension skills are lacking and you're just wanting to have a shot at Kent because he must have written something bad about your club at some point. (I completely get the hatred of Journo's by the way, they are scum, but the basis for your anger is misguided on this one).
Wayne made three points. 1) Benji denied making the statement. 2) Benji denied speaking to Kent. 3) Benji denied making the statement directly to Kent.
Kent knows that these three points are a hostile attack on his integrity as a journalist because they provide interesting insight into his personal and journalistic ethics. On NRL 360 Kent's ego got the better of him for a moment (as it usually does) and he made a statement about Benji that was heavily implied to be a first hand factual account of that person's thoughts. There was no "allegedly" or "according to" or "rumor has it" - anyone watching that would have been left with the impression either that Paul gained that information from Marshall himself, or that it's undisputed common knowledge which it obviously was not.
Now in the meantime we find out that Kent is using his personal relationship with Ikin to needle information out of him regarding the Broncos. Since Benji denied saying that he was "horrified", and knowing that the information didn't come from Benji himself, we now know that "horrified" is somebody elses spin of events - again, something not made clear by Kent on NRL 360.
According to Kent he called up Benji afterwards to apologise. This demonstrates how easy it would have been for Kent to call up Benji in the first place and actually verify that the information relayed to him by a third party was correct before putting it out there for general consumption. And that's kind of his responsibility as a journalist. It also suggests that Kent really only cared about any backlash to Benji when he himself came under fire.
So all of this reveals a few things:
1) As a Limited News journalist, Kent doesn't feel that he is under any obligation to approach the primary subject of a story and confirm basic information about it.
2) As a Limited News journalist, Kent will go on television and pass off second hand gossip as fact.
3) As a Limited News journalist, Kent will milk his close friendship with Ikin to Ikin's detriment just to satisfy his own ego.
There's a reason why Kent's explanation is woefully nonsensical - there's no shortage of easily fooled people like yourself out there.
