Our new halfback should be

[Morepudding]

This
Yes he was but it seems everyone has forgotten

Kahu is a very talented player. Yes he has had his moments in relations to rules this season, But he is incredibly safe under the highball, and very good at getting under the ball in defence. I remember him doing some cracker try savers. Boyd doesn't seem to be doing great this season. I think perhaps the captaincy is impacting on his performance, or maybe age is catching up to him, i'm not sure what it is, but several times this season he has received the ball and sort of just stood there like a deer in headlights. He hasn't been awful or anything, just not the same high standard as previously. I think this could be the reason there is strong talk of him finishing career in centres...

 

[Morepudding]

750k for Widdop and 1.2 million for Hunt ... they will be on their knees praying that the salary cap get's near 10 million ... or they will be fucked

You say this, But the storm have spent $3 mil on 3 players for basically ever... The cap will be higher than ever before so spending $3 mil on 3 of the 4 spine members (1,6,7,9) will become pretty common. I mean Broncos are going to possibly be spending that much on Boyd, Milford and Bird as well. Cowboys would be close with JT, Lolo, Morgan, Dragons (already spoken about), Storm (if they get a Foran like player) with Smith and Slater, Bulldogs with possibly Woods, Tedesco and Mbye, or Rooster with Tedesco, Pearce and Friend.

I think basically every club will end up spending around the 3-3.5 mil mark on 4 players.

 

[pagey]

750k for Widdop and 1.2 million for Hunt ... they will be on their knees praying that the salary cap get's near 10 million ... or they will be fucked

Yeah and there trying to keep duges aswell

 

[Waynesaurus]

750k for Widdop and 1.2 million for Hunt ... they will be on their knees praying that the salary cap get's near 10 million ... or they will be fucked

Well should the cap really be increased anyway? The majority of clubs aren't even making a profit at the current cap level.

This major inflation of player values based on an assumption is not a good thing for our game.

Its beyond me how the NRL can accept and register these new player contracts for next year when they haven't even settled on a figure the clubs need to comply with.

The NRL has made this mess by not settling on a new cap figure.

 

[Foordy]

Boyd doesn't seem to be doing great this season. I think perhaps the captaincy is impacting on his performance, or maybe age is catching up to him, i'm not sure what it is, but several times this season he has received the ball and sort of just stood there like a deer in headlights. He hasn't been awful or anything, just not the same high standard as previously. I think this could be the reason there is strong talk of him finishing career in centres...

I must be watching a different game to you, because Boyd has been consistently one of our best this year

 

[broncos4life]

You say this, But the storm have spent $3 mil on 3 players for basically ever... The cap will be higher than ever before so spending $3 mil on 3 of the 4 spine members (1,6,7,9) will become pretty common. I mean Broncos are going to possibly be spending that much on Boyd, Milford and Bird as well. Cowboys would be close with JT, Lolo, Morgan, Dragons (already spoken about), Storm (if they get a Foran like player) with Smith and Slater, Bulldogs with possibly Woods, Tedesco and Mbye, or Rooster with Tedesco, Pearce and Friend.

I think basically every club will end up spending around the 3-3.5 mil mark on 4 players.

Yes, but those three players are once in a generation type players. Hunt and Widdop are no where near.

 

[Morkel]

You say this, But the storm have spent $3 mil on 3 players for basically ever... The cap will be higher than ever before so spending $3 mil on 3 of the 4 spine members (1,6,7,9) will become pretty common. I mean Broncos are going to possibly be spending that much on Boyd, Milford and Bird as well. Cowboys would be close with JT, Lolo, Morgan, Dragons (already spoken about), Storm (if they get a Foran like player) with Smith and Slater, Bulldogs with possibly Woods, Tedesco and Mbye, or Rooster with Tedesco, Pearce and Friend.

I think basically every club will end up spending around the 3-3.5 mil mark on 4 players.

No they haven't. Not officially anyway. The first half decade they were cheating the cap, whatever they were being paid is irrelevant. When they did have to start complying with the cap, those original figures still stood, but it required a mass player exodus to get the whole team under. IIRC their values at that time (~2010) were around $500 - $600k each.

It's only recently, in the last couple of years, that their values have been close to $1m each, and I still don't think any of them have cracked that, maybe $800k. And it's not sustainable, as there are a bunch of younger players on serious unders, knowing that they'll get more (but not $1 mill each) as each of the Big 3 retire.

And like @broncos4life said, they're once-in-a-generation players. Smith is once in a lifetime. Just because these 3 players can make a team of journeymen competitive does not mean the same for another team, just because they spend $3 million on their top 3 players.

 

[BroncsFan]

Well should the cap really be increased anyway? The majority of clubs aren't even making a profit at the current cap level.

This major inflation of player values based on an assumption is not a good thing for our game.

Its beyond me how the NRL can accept and register these new player contracts for next year when they haven't even settled on a figure the clubs need to comply with.

The NRL has made this mess by not settling on a new cap figure.

Pretty sure the NRL provides a grant to each club, which covers the salary cap as a minimum.

I believe the teams are looking for 130% of the cap under the new deal?? It was a sticking point a few months ago and resulted in john Grant having to step down next year or something

 

[johnny plath]

Well should the cap really be increased anyway? The majority of clubs aren't even making a profit at the current cap level.

This major inflation of player values based on an assumption is not a good thing for our game.

Its beyond me how the NRL can accept and register these new player contracts for next year when they haven't even settled on a figure the clubs need to comply with.

The NRL has made this mess by not settling on a new cap figure.

No doubt the NRL has its share of shit admin decisions, but who started all the speculation about a 10million dollar cap? media, Players association? Clubs? And who's holding it up at the moment - is it the RLPA. It seems to me the players are the ones trying to squeeze the dollars out but the NRL are the ones that cop all the flack. Aren't they even talking about industrial action now if its not 10mill next year? I dunno, but we seem to be letting the players and their union off pretty easy here.. it's not like we're haggling trying to get players off the minimum wage of 18 bucks an hour. FMD, minimum wage is around 85k and ranging up to over a mill for the upper echelon players, so it's not exactly like players are missing out - just getting a touch greedy and trying to put the all the blame back on NRL for being slow.

 

[Renegade]

No doubt the NRL has its share of shit admin decisions, but who started all the speculation about a 10million dollar cap? media, Players association? Clubs? And who's holding it up at the moment - is it the RLPA. It seems to me the players are the ones trying to squeeze the dollars out but the NRL are the ones that cop all the flack. Aren't they even talking about industrial action now if its not 10mill next year? I dunno, but we seem to be letting the players and their union off pretty easy here.. it's not like we're haggling trying to get players off the minimum wage of 18 bucks an hour. FMD, minimum wage is around 85k and ranging up to over a mill for the upper echelon players, so it's not exactly like players are missing out - just getting a touch greedy and trying to put the all the blame back on NRL for being slow.

the players hold the power and they know it. what are you gonna do, play a comp without them?

i would like to see the NRL go, ok - we'll take you on, I hope you're ok with not being paid and then when you do eventually return to work, i hope you're ok with being paid significantly less because the aforementioned strike etc would weaken the NRL on a whole w/r/t the value of the brand/tv rights etc.

 

[Morkel]

No doubt the NRL has its share of shit admin decisions, but who started all the speculation about a 10million dollar cap? media, Players association? Clubs? And who's holding it up at the moment - is it the RLPA. It seems to me the players are the ones trying to squeeze the dollars out but the NRL are the ones that cop all the flack. Aren't they even talking about industrial action now if its not 10mill next year? I dunno, but we seem to be letting the players and their union off pretty easy here.. it's not like we're haggling trying to get players off the minimum wage of 18 bucks an hour. FMD, minimum wage is around 85k and ranging up to over a mill for the upper echelon players, so it's not exactly like players are missing out - just getting a touch greedy and trying to put the all the blame back on NRL for being slow.

True. The NRL did make an offer to the RLPA, that included pretty much every demand they wanted (including insurances and money for club welfare / doctors etc), except for the magical $10 million figure, and the RLPA walked off like they'd been offered a pie and a free ticket.

 

[Foordy]

True. The NRL did make an offer to the RLPA, that included pretty much every demand they wanted (including insurances and money for club welfare / doctors etc), except for the magical $10 million figure, and the RLPA walked off like they'd been offered a pie and a free ticket.

The low ball offer was always on the cards once the club's forced the NRL's hand on the grant of 130% of the salary cap

 

[GCBRONCO]

According to Chris Garry you can rule George Williams out of the picture set to re-sign with Wigan, he was seeking a million a season in the NRL and no club was interested in that.

 

[Foordy]

According to Chris Garry you can rule George Williams out of the picture set to re-sign with Wigan, he was seeking a million a season in the NRL and no club was interested in that.

he was never going to get that over here ... he was dreaming if he thought he could. if he thought he was worth that should have signed a much smaller 1 year contract and backed himself to prove his worth.

 

[KnToad]

I must be watching a different game to you, because Boyd has been consistently one of our best this year

Yeh he has been one of our best in a team that has not exactly been tearing it up (until
Last week).
It looks like other teams have wised up to his second man coming into the line role and have been very successfully snuffing the play out.

I wonder if this has affected his confidence in attack and hence his propensity lately to stop in his tracks when he gets thrown the ball in broken play and become easy meat for an advancing defensive line.

I want to see the back rowers/centres recognizing when this happens and giving him some options by running some lines through the d line instead of all standing there looking at him wondering what he's doing and where he's going.

Last week was much better as we threw it around a bit and broke up the defensive line of the rooters. That gave Milf and Boyd some openings to work with hence the scoreline

 

[Sproj]

Last week was much better as we threw it around a bit and broke up the defensive line of the rooters. That gave Milf and Boyd some openings to work with hence the scoreline

Exactly! This is what we did against the Storm late last year and they had no idea where to defend. We pulled it out against the Roosters last week and they had the same result.

It isn't always going to work but more often than not it will because we have such a strong defensive foundation. The team we have is full of pace and skill, until last week, we hadn't really been using it. More of the same from this week on thanks boys!

 

[KnToad]

I still don't understand why, after a very successful 2015 which featured Parker throwing offloads at will, it stopped in 2016??
The broken play that created was one of the major reasons we had such an outstanding season in attack. Combined with the brick wall defense we nearly went all the way.
Then it stopped and so did any chance we had if going all the way in 2016. We all thought we would build on the last minute disappointment of 2015 but we just stopped attacking and it all became a bit of a slog...

 

[KnToad]

And Melbourne have gone cold on foran apparently. Crazy times ! No one has a clue by the sounds of it .

Maybe Bellyache is thinking about getting Widdop back in the band