Ryan opens up on Sharks’ supplements saga

Former Tigers and Sharks winger Beau Ryan has opened up on Cronulla's "darkest days", speaking on the supplements saga scandal that rocked the Shire club in 2013.

Ryan joined the Sharks ahead of the 2013 season and was quickly immersed within an investigation directed by the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority (ASADA).

ASADA had uncovered the Sharks' supplemental program of 2011 - a period of which Ryan wasn't present at the club.

Despite this, the new recruit was placed in the midst of the investigation that marred the Sharks for the years to come.

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The 36-year-old revealed how the playing group were first made aware of the news of the doping saga investigation.

“I got there in 2013 but this happened in ‘11,” Ryan said on I'm A Celebrity ... Get Me Out Of Here! on Tuesday.

“We got called in at training one day and the integrity unit was there and the (NRL) commission and all these people.

“And they said, ‘You’ve seen the news? This is going to be one of the darkest days in sport. Something happened at this club in regards to doping and stuff. Be honest and tell us what’s happened because they’ve got ya’.

“We were in a room for like 12 hours. That was the first day of the investigation.”

"We’d be training and they’d go, ‘All right, four players, boom’, straight into an interrogation with ASADA.

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“They were saying, ‘You come forward and say yeah you’ve doped, we’ll give you a six-month suspension that you serve in the pre-season’.”

Being among a host of new names and fresh faces under coach Shane Flanagan, Ryan wasn't alone in being new at the Sharks in 2013 and having not been involved in the supplements program from two years prior.

The gruelling investigation led to a major rift in the club, which was home to a large number of recruits at the time.

“We had a lot, probably 40 per cent new players in the team,” Ryan said.

“I remember there was a few of us going, ‘What is it?’ And they were like, ‘They know’. “Who’s they? They tried to smoke out everyone out and then the team just fell apart.”

The Sharks were fined $1 million - with $400,000 suspended - and Flanagan was suspended for 12 months.

Ryan played just two seasons of his three-year contract with Cronulla, announcing his immediate retirement from the NRL in 2014 after suffering a severe neck injury.