A surprisingly excellent idea in an article yesterday

[Red Bear]

Reading the Sun Herald yesterday, saw an article with what is a very good idea from Colin Love, and could help us keep our star players in the game

A central contract system!!!
Similar to cricket, the top how ever many players are contracted to australia or NZ (or Great Britain), being paid a fee that doesnt count towards the salary cap.

This would make the cap itself slightly more complex, as you couldnt simply say every team has the same cap as it would give too much of an advantage to the top sides, so my idea there would be to work out a decent average wage, roughly 200 000 x (25-central contracted players).

This would have the effect of

- keeping players both loyal to the game and more likely to be loyal to clubs
- Rewarding clubs for producing excellent talent
- mean the rest of the players get a better wage
- would still keep a salary cap at affordable levels (at most 5 000 000)
- see an improvement in International competition

Thoughts and opinions?

 

[hellteam]

Good idea. This idea isnt new, read a story a while ago where Darren Lockyer was saying this should happen.

I think the Australian Rugby Union have something similar ?

 

[bazza]

I don't think it is a good idea

What if all the centrally contracted players happen to come from one or two clubs? Does the NRL/ARL tell them what clubs they have to play with?

A better idea would be to increase the amount that players get for representative games. This is similar to central contracting but is less open to political influence as the best players should be picked for teams and then they will get more money

 

[East Coast Tiger]

It's still a lot of money that we don't have. Plus you've got the problem of who gets it. Will it be for anybody that plays for Australia, anybody that has played for Australia 10 or more times, anyone who plays Origin, what about Kiwis? will it be one per club etc. In theory it sounds good but maybe the money would be better spent elsewhere. Just say this cost $1m a year, and it probably would have to be a fair amount to be worthwhile, imagine what $1m could do for the game in the Pacific or the US or South Africa. If we could spend that kind of money overseas we might just create a stronger international game and with it attract more revenue that will help solve this issue of losing players without just throwing money at individuals simply for not screwing the game over and leaving for union.

 

[Red Bear]

It's still a lot of money that we don't have. Plus you've got the problem of who gets it. Will it be for anybody that plays for Australia, anybody that has played for Australia 10 or more times, anyone who plays Origin, what about Kiwis? will it be one per club etc. In theory it sounds good but maybe the money would be better spent elsewhere. Just say this cost $1m a year, and it probably would have to be a fair amount to be worthwhile, imagine what $1m could do for the game in the Pacific or the US or South Africa. If we could spend that kind of money overseas we might just create a stronger international game and with it attract more revenue that will help solve this issue of losing players without just throwing money at individuals simply for not screwing the game over and leaving for union.

it'd the best 17 from the previous year
anyone could still get picked for aust, nz tho.

 

[alexc]

Yeah so they would be doing this already if they had the money.

 

[Red Bear]

Yeah so they would be doing this already if they had the money.

theres about 8 million each year that goes into news coffers...

 

[dallymessenger]

so to compare :

the boss of the ARL has an idea to keep our stars in league.

and the boss of the NRLs idea to keep our stars is court action.

 

[dallymessenger]

theres about 8 million each year that goes into news coffers...

$8 million divided by $200,000 extra = 40 players

 

[East Coast Tiger]

it'd the best 17 from the previous year
anyone could still get picked for aust, nz tho.

17 best judged by who? There's more than 17 Aussie reps per year and what about Kiwis and others? They are still NRL players so if the NRL is funding this they should have as much right to these contracts as Australian players. In any case the logistics of it is not the point. The point is, we don't have the money and even if we did wouldn't it be better spent elsewhere.

 

[Burwood]

Would be easy to raise a large chunk of the money required. Give sponsors of the NRL access to the contracted players- they can be used for advertising campaigns and corporate functions etc. It would help to reduce the trouble player-managers are having attracting 3rd party sponsors for their clients as companies would be more likely to depart with their hard-earned if the had greater access to the players.

 

[bazza]

it'd the best 17 from the previous year
anyone could still get picked for aust, nz tho.

The 17 best players in the NRL should be selected to play for Australia or NZ

Get some decent test match schedules in advance and pay the players 10k per game and that will be a decent amount of extra cash for the top players in the NRL

 

[jimmythehand]

I don't think this idea would be accepted by the NRL because it does not promote an 'even' competition. You could potentially have one club getting all the bonuses.

How about the NRL topping up 2 'marquee' players from each club with another 200k?

 

[boonboon]

Heres an idea - the salary cap works - clubs arent going broke , young blokes are earning 500k a year, they have the ability to sell themselves through third party sponsorships- as many as they want (its unlimited if you and your manager are good enough to promote yourself)

The issue is - a few players have gone overseas - some for money but of the big stars who have gone over the last few years none have been missed

Gasnier - went cuase his contract wasnt being honoured
SBW - went for reasons other then money - he said it
Gower - other reasons '

Also if the players want more money they need to improve thier image and this as a group would help clubs make more too

 

[mave]

The 17 best players in the NRL should be selected to play for Australia or NZ

Get some decent test match schedules in advance and pay the players 10k per game and that will be a decent amount of extra cash for the top players in the NRL

Great in theory but when has it ever actually happened?

 

[Day of Rockening]

so to compare :

the boss of the ARL has an idea to keep our stars in league.

and the boss of the NRLs idea to keep our stars is court action.

they dont have the money on hand dally.

one would think they would need to do some creative accounting....

and there is a difference between doing it for a relocation/merger and paying players.

its kind of like the difference between taking out a loan at 18-28% interest to buy a second hand old rice rocket, or putting it toward a deposit for a house.

go figure man.

 

[The Tank]

Heres an idea - the salary cap works - clubs arent going broke , young blokes are earning 500k a year, they have the ability to sell themselves through third party sponsorships- as many as they want (its unlimited if you and your manager are good enough to promote yourself)

The issue is - a few players have gone overseas - some for money but of the big stars who have gone over the last few years none have been missed

Gasnier - went cuase his contract wasnt being honoured
SBW - went for reasons other then money - he said it
Gower - other reasons '

Also if the players want more money they need to improve thier image and this as a group would help clubs make more too

:lol:

 

[Eels Dude]

An idea like this works in cricket and rugby because they play enough internationals to make it worthwhile. Cricket Australia chooses the players they want contracted based on who plan on using for the test and one day series throughout the next year.

As others have said in this thread already, who decides which players deserve contracts and who's going to pay them is the main issue. I mean to pick 25 players and hand them 200k up front when they're really doing nothing more than players who just miss out isn't very fair on the rest of the players in the NRL.

It also defies the purpose of a salary cap if a side such as Melbourne have 4 or 5 players in their squad receiving a 200k top up, while a side like the Raiders has zero.

 

[Simo]

Edit:
Ill put this in a new thread as looking back its kind of a hijack.

 

[Perth Red]

Why should the NRL pay anything? Surely it is the clubs responsibility to raise income to increase the salary cap?