NRL: Johnson plays down racist comments

Shaun Johnson's mother is Laotian and his father is Pakeha. Photo / Getty Images

Warriors halfback Shaun Johnson, who yesterday revealed he had been the victim of racism, has refused to elaborate on his claims today.

The New Zealand-born 21-year-old, whose mother is Laotian and father is Pakeha, told 3News last night that last weekend he was confronted with racist comments.

He did not say where they came from or the nature of the comments.

'I'm not going to give anyone my time who's throwing around racial comments or anything like that but I certainly see it, it's always there," he said.

Johnson, who is a prolific Twitter user and has 6394 followers, refused today to elaborate on his comments.

A spokesman for the club said the star was playing down the incident and instead was concentrating on Sunday's crunch match against the South Sydney Rabbitohs.

"It (racism) is not a club issue," said the spokesman, who added that racism recorded on the Auckland-based club's Facebook page was at "negligible" levels.

Warriors chief executive Wayne Scurrah was unavailable for comment.

Johnson's comments came after Blues coach Pat Lam, who is under pressure after his team has lost five of their opening six games in this year's Super Rugby campaign, fought back tears at a media conference this week as he revealed racial comments on websites and social media was taking its toll on his parents.