Brave rugby star, 22, reveals how he texted team-mates to say he’s bisexual by joking ‘none of you are on my radar’
A BRAVE rugby star has revealed how he texted team-mates to say he's bisexual - and then joked "none of you are on my radar".
Ex-Bath and England player Levi Davis, 22, has gone public with his sexuality after his "sense of shame at not being normal" drove him to drinking and mental health issues.
In an interview with the , Levi explained how he posted the announcement on the team's WhatsApp group as a "spur of the moment" decision.
He said: "I had hidden it well but I couldn’t keep it secret any longer. I had to tell them, all of them, not just a few. I didn’t want it to turn into Chinese whispers."
The young player wrote in a message: "Hi guys. I just want to tell you something that’s been eating away at me for four years now.
"I want to be open and honest with you boys, as friends and team-mates. I’m bisexual. It’s something I have known since I was 18."
He then told his team-mates: "none of you lot are on my radar... so it’s OK".
Levi, who was taken into foster care as a child, told the paper that he believes "it is important for people to be themselves within rugby".
He said: "Thankfully we can now discuss mental health more openly. And in the same way, I want people to feel that they can be who they are and that it is OK to be who they are.
"Hiding who you are can kill you – and has killed people.
"I don’t know yet where I am going, but by talking today I can walk hand-in-hand with whoever I want and it won’t matter any more because it’s out there.
"I realise, though, that I am a bit niche and difficult to categorise: a black, bisexual, privately educated rugby professional. Even black people who hear me on the phone sometimes say, 'You don’t sound black, you sound white'."
Levi said that Bath - who have won the Premiership six times - "responded amazingly" to his admission.
The club helped him through difficult times when his mental health deteriorated because of the secret he was keeping.
Levi started drinking because he felt "a sense of shame, because I felt, and still do, as though I’m not normal".
After his form dropped, he joined Ealing Trailfinders in West London last month on a two-year deal - which he has found equally supportive.
Levi said even his family did not know about his sexuality.
He said: "They are all worried about me, of course, and I can understand why.
"Sometimes I feel it would be easier if I was gay and nothing else. Then I could identify myself and it would be easier to explain."
Most read in news
Levi added: "Just because I’m bisexual does not make me any less of a man.
"I still want a wife and kids. That much has been true since I was in foster care. And that’s because I didn’t have a dad."
Sports star Levi was also on Celebrity X Factor last year when he formed a boy band called Try Star with fellow rugby players Thom Evans and Ben Foden.
