Mitchell agrees to terms with Souths – but Roosters want money back
By Andrew Webster
January 10, 2020 — 12.01am
Roosters centre Latrell Mitchell has finally agreed to terms with South Sydney, who are confident he will be at Redfern on Monday morning for his first training session.
The contract is yet to be officially signed, however, and also needs to be ratified by the NRL salary cap auditor.
Another final stumbling block could be the Roosters, who are expected to ask for the $116,000 they have already paid the 22-year-old international since November to be returned to them.
It was unclear at the time of writing exactly what the Rabbitohs deal would look like, with Souths wary of making any announcement before the contract was officially signed.
The club has said all along it could only offer him a one-year deal for 2020 and would then have to move on players from 2021 to accommodate a larger deal.
What is certain is that Souths do not have to register a contract for Mitchell at "market value" for the 2020 season, despite reports saying otherwise.
The large deals offered to him by the Roosters and the Wests Tigers are irrelevant to his contract for this year.
According to the NRL, Souths only need to match the value of Mitchell’s current deal with the Roosters. That figure is $700,000, of which two months has already been paid.
Other clubs interested in Mitchell have offered to compensate the Roosters for what they’ve already paid him, but it is unlikely Souths would consider it — or have the salary cap space to do so.
Mitchell’s imminent signing is another chapter in a long-standing feud between the two foundation clubs, which have fought over players like Ron Coote, Craig Wing and, in more recent times, Angus Crichton.
It will also finally bring closure to one of the messiest off-season contract negotiations in recent memory.
They started in November when he rejected the Roosters’ $800,000-a-season extension on his current deal.
Mitchell then spoke to the Tigers, Cowboys, Titans and Bulldogs, but a management dispute with accredited manager Wayde Rushton so he could sign Matt Rose stalled the process.
A settlement worth $55,000 was reached with Rushton earlier this week.
Souths had made Titans forward Jai Arrow their focus instead of Mitchell, signing him to a four-year deal from 2021 after the shock retirement of Sam Burgess in the off-season because of a shoulder injury.
They had been confident earlier this week of securing Arrow a season early, but when that became less likely they moved onto Mitchell.
https://www.smh.com.au/sport/nrl/mi...roosters-want-money-back-20200109-p53q6c.html
