Ah-kwilla You-ah-tay

[Rod]

What makes it worse is without a good centre inside him (and ultimately the salary that a good centre comes with), he can be very average - just as he was earlier this season. For 10% of the salary cap he needs to be great all the time. He isn't.

He is great all the time. The first 10 weeks of this season were an anomaly in his career where he saw basically no ball due to the team playing terrible football and barely going past one-off the ruck. Although I will grant that having an average centre inside him did not help matters.

Journalists don't just pluck figures from the air to write articles

You obviously don't know what journalists are like. Making up shit is 80% of their job.

 

[Newie is God's Country]

Aku is the best going around JM. Duffie, Perett and Ash Graham would be the three next best for all round attributes for me. None better than Aku though. I leave out Hayne etc. simply cos you just get into a ' what is his best playing position' debate which is a waste of time cos noone agrees on any of it.

 

[broncos2010]

Well take it this way if you guys were offering Edwards 250k a year at the start of the season what is Uate worth then?

I think at least 400-500k

 

[Joker's Wild]

Edwards was offered $200K a year last December

But hey, lets just make shit up

 

[broncos2010]

50k here or there...

End of the day pay up or lose him.I am sure he would be more then happy to test out his market value with a club like ammm maybe roosters?

 

[Noname36]

Good god you guys are seeing this with massive red and blue eyes. The guy is a good finisher, and it would be great to keep him, however he isn't worth putting up 10% of our salary cap just to keep him.

What makes it worse is without a good centre inside him (and ultimately the salary that a good centre comes with), he can be very average - just as he was earlier this season. For 10% of the salary cap he needs to be great all the time. He isn't.

Jono - he is a winger, not a front rower. That was one of his biggest problems - that he comes off his wing and looking to do everybody elses job. Finally he has a coach telling him to stay on his wing and do his job.

As far as marketability - I can not realistically seeing him bringing in crowds just because he is in the side like Andrew Johns was back in the day. The club will still fill the grounds with or without him.

In regards to his manager and demands - who do you reckon instigated the article? Journalists don't just pluck figures from the air to write articles - they have got that figure from somewhere and it is most likely his management putting the club on notice in a public forum. That might have been the way business was done with the club in the past, but not now. The club has been very clear that they do not talk to the media about negotiations with players, so I doubt the "source in Newcastle" was from the Knights management.

Stop looking at this with your hearts, and think about the club and the best thing for the future. An expensive winger when we realistically need a half and a front rower to be a genuine top 4 club does not make sense.

This would have to be the most ridiculous thing I've read in a while. Yes, he is a winger, and no, I do not believe that Bennett would even consider resigning him for 500k under the cap. However what Aku does for the club in terms of marketing cannot be overlooked.

A lot of our supporter base is ageing, and while players like Bedsy and Gids may be club legends, they're not the type of "superstar" players that are going to encourage young kids to support the Knights. Aku is that type of player, and he's exactly who we should be using to promote the club to kids. I work in Newcastle in Allied Health where I'm exposed to a lot of kids, and they absolutely adore the guy. You just can't replace players who are naturally wonderful to watch, and we don't have the luxury of having any other genuine superstars in our side like a Hayne or a Slater to pick up the slack if we lost Aku.

 

[docbrown]

They won't let Uate leave.

 

[Mr_Knightside]

This would have to be the most ridiculous thing I've read in a while. Yes, he is a winger, and no, I do not believe that Bennett would even consider resigning him for 500k under the cap. However what Aku does for the club in terms of marketing cannot be overlooked.

A lot of our supporter base is ageing, and while players like Bedsy and Gids may be club legends, they're not the type of "superstar" players that are going to encourage young kids to support the Knights. Aku is that type of player, and he's exactly who we should be using to promote the club to kids. I work in Newcastle in Allied Health where I'm exposed to a lot of kids, and they absolutely adore the guy. You just can't replace players who are naturally wonderful to watch, and we don't have the luxury of having any other genuine superstars in our side like a Hayne or a Slater to pick up the slack if we lost Aku.

100% agree.

As much as I think this is a bit of a media beat-up and maybe 500k is a pretty inflated amount for a winger, Aku has earned the right to ask for a bigger slice of the pie for his next contract. Now to my understanding we signed him relatively cheap last time around when he was still fighting for a position in the FG side and since then he has exploded onto the scene and has been IMO the stand-out winger in the NRL for the last 3 years but may not even be in the top 5 highest paid wingers.

This guy is our no.1 strike weapon bar none and is probably our no.1 draw card as well. I don't think that Aku is walking around the club telling everyone he wants 500k next contract, but I'm sure that he would be thinking that his form warrants a significant pay rise. I also reckon that this 500k talk is just the initial number that maybe his manager throws out there but doesn't actually expect it, just trying to put pressure on the club to send more money Aku's way.

Newcastle should be doing everything they can to keep Aku here for the rest of his career, and I think that's what Aku would like to do to.

 

[Alex28]

So whilst you are all bagging my opinion (and it is just that - an opinion can't be a "lie", nor can it be wrong), we do actually agree that he isn't worth $500K a year?

So... If that is what he demands and it is either that or he walks, what do you guys suggest we do? Continue playing with a team that is realistically 1 or 2 players short of a top 4 team to accommodate him?

I think about how to balance budgets every day as a job, and the salary cap is probably the hardest budget to balance. $500K for a winger just puts too much pressure on the rest of the team. That's the cash for a member of the spine tied up on the wing.

JM - will get back to you with my wingers...

 

[Hanscholo]

Yea given the amount the cap is going up 500k seems close to the mark, still think it would be closed to mid 400's. He is not just a fall over the try line kind of winger, he is an attacking weapon so deserves fullback quality money.

 

[Alex28]

If he deserves "fullback quality money", then play him at fullback. If not, he gets paid as a winger.

This could be Tahu all over again. Remember when he felt he was worth more and wanted to play centre at a higher salary?

If he gets $400K, but $250K comes from the cap and $150K comes from third parties, then that sounds fair. Any more and it really affects the quality of the rest of the team...but also how does a company get $150K worth of value out of him?

 

[Newie is God's Country]

He may get 500 with a third party component and that is more than fair. He could actually make more off third party as he is very marketable. I don't dispute that. If he was to go it would cause a massive uproar but it would not last long. Our club needs to mature and be bigger than idol worship. We have been smashed by player managers for years cos they use the pressure from fans and the backlash of local faves leaving as leverage to milk every Dollar they can out of us. Those days are over.

 

[Joker's Wild]

So whilst you are all bagging my opinion (and it is just that - an opinion can't be a "lie", nor can it be wrong), we do actually agree that he isn't worth $500K a year?

So... If that is what he demands and it is either that or he walks, what do you guys suggest we do? Continue playing with a team that is realistically 1 or 2 players short of a top 4 team to accommodate him?

I think about how to balance budgets every day as a job, and the salary cap is probably the hardest budget to balance. $500K for a winger just puts too much pressure on the rest of the team. That's the cash for a member of the spine tied up on the wing.

JM - will get back to you with my wingers...

lol yes it can

 

[Alex28]

o-pin-ion - A view or judgment formed about something

JW - lol, no it can't.

 

[orochimaru]

in my opinion heroin is good for you

 

[Robbie'o'Davis]

in my opinion, ahkwilla should have his own energy drink...

 

[Big Tim]

If the price is too high, someone will have to budge.

If Morris is on the market for a reasonable top-tier winger salary I could see us going that direction, or at least using it as leverage to get a fair price for both parties.

 

[Rod]

In my opinion Scott Minto is better than Uate.

Because this is my opinion does that mean I can't be wrong?

 

[RHCP]

No single position is more important than another. The whole obsession with a good 'spine' has gone too far imo. If you are world class, you are world class, whether you are in the 11, the 7, the 1 or the 14. In the modern game, wingers are no longer players who just hang around with footballers, it's more than just diving over a tryline untouched. And Aku is world class.

It's the responsibility of the winger to start off a set well from the back and get a quick play the ball to roll off the back of. There is no winger in the competition that comes close to Aku at doing this as well. Some wingers finish tries, Uate can create them from a solo bust deep in our own half. He is an X-factor so many clubs wish they could have.

Add his on field ability to his marketability and I believe he is worth $400-500K to us. Maybe if we had Cooper Cronk on the books coming off contract we might need to let Uate go to keep him. But the fact of the matter is we don't. Nobody else in our side can command that sort of money. There isn't $500K players knocking down the door to join us either. Uate could be the winger of his generation.

Within our current side, I can't see where else that money needs to be spent.

 

[RABK]

lol remember how Tinks got Snowden. Like he's really going to let Aku f**king Uate walk out of the club.

There will be a casino resort built and owned by Aku's mother in Fiji before you ever see Aku walk out on the Knights.

I'm not even worried about it.

And Alex about getting a good half and prop, if it's what we really need then the cap rise and the other 7 or 8 blokes off contract in 2013 should accomodate the new props and halfs salaries. You make it sound like the extra 150k we'll need to pay Uate from his current 250k deal is going to bust our salary cap. We are not signing Uate for 500k from the Roosters, he's under the books for 250k already. If push came to shove and we really had to pay 250k extra straight up then losing Costigan and Hilder to pay Uate an extra 250k and promote a couple of young forwards is a good move.