Peter Badel, Chris Garry, Todd Balym
The Courier-Mail
May 02, 2012 12:00AM
THE Broncos are fighting grimly to hold on to Ben Te'o, with South Sydney and the Bulldogs emerging as major threats in the race to sign the hard-hitting utility.
Brisbane operations chief Andrew Gee said last night the club was desperate to retain the off-contract Te'o, but conceded the Broncos could be trumped by more lucrative offers from potential suitors due to salary-cap constraints.
Speculation sweeping league circles suggests the Rabbitohs are front-runners, with the Redfern outfit viewing Maroons Origin hopeful Te'o as a readymade replacement for Test forward Dave Taylor, who has verbally agreed to a four-year deal with the Titans.
The Broncos are also facing a challenge from the Bulldogs, who are understood to have done background checks on Te'o to ascertain whether he would be a good fit for the new regime under coach Des Hasler.
Te'o, who returns from a two-match ban against the Warriors on Saturday night, and veteran prop Petero Civoniceva are the only top-line Broncos without contracts for 2013 after Gerard Beale signed with the Dragons a fortnight ago.
The Broncos have been in delicate negotiations with Te'o's management for the past few months and Gee said the club was doing everything possible to keep the 25-year-old.
"He has indicated he wants to stay, but it's tough," Gee said.
"It is never easy with the salary cap and the reality is you can't keep everyone.
"Our negotiations with Ben have gone slowly but our focus is on keeping the guys we have here."
Te'o's manager Isaac Moses declined to comment last night, but the Broncos utility said a fortnight ago there was a possibility he could be squeezed out by salary-cap pressures.
"I'm hoping the club can find a way to keep me," Te'o said at the time.
"I love Brisbane, I love the club and the boys here, I've become very close to a lot of people here."
Yesterday morning, a pragmatic Broncos coach Anthony Griffin said while he hoped to re-sign Teo, he was not confident.
"I'm not confident with any of them. It's life - it's the salary cap," Griffin said.
Te'o was yesterday named to make his comeback against an improving Warriors outfit this Saturday after serving his ban for the shoulder charge which knocked out Wests Tigers forward Matthew Groat in round 6.
Griffin said he did not not need to lecture Te'o about getting rid of the shoulder charge.
"I would say the process he has been through and having to sit some time out, he might correct that himself," Griffin said.
Given the representative bye weekend has also fallen since that April 6 encounter, Te'o has gone a full month without football.
"His form was pretty good up until then (the suspension), he played five or six games and was going OK," Griffin said.
Despite the Warriors having only won three games, Griffin has his team on high alert after watching last year's grand finalists run in eight tries against South Sydney at home two weeks ago.
Griffin is still having nightmares of the 70m solo try scored by halfback Shaun Johnson in last year's epic 21-20 win by the Broncos at Suncorp Stadium in round 22.
"Those couple of tries he scored against us last year obviously leave a lasting real big imprint in your brain about how good he is," Griffin said.
"They're a serious football team and have been building up for a few years now."
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