I don't blame Lichaa for taking a $300 000 deal if that is what he is offered. He would be insane not to, at his age and level of experience. Good luck to him, I hope he does well, and adds to the NRL, as long as he doesn't beat the Sharks in a grand final!
I don't blame Fifita for taking $850000. I'm not sure if the extra $50000 or so per year is worth the risk of having a Snowden (or dare I say T-Rex) like reversion in form in a different squad, or the ire of current team mates and a year of not feeling like one of the boys, but its his life and his career and his decision to weigh up the pros and cons.
I never begrudge any player making a choice about their careers- it's a fundamental right we all should have, to pursue a career where we like, if we are good enough.
But by the same token, the Sharks are entirely entitled as a club, to make decisions they see as best for their future. Maybe we will need Lichaa to have some more experience come finals and an unforseen injury, and will regret not giving him more time. Maybe we will find it was a good decision allowing other players to instead get the experience he would have had, and those players give more back to the club over the next few years, not just this year.
Who knows? There are lots of variables and you can't make a decision like dropping a player so as not to develop him with 100% certainty of future consequences. I trust the club has probably made the right decision, but they certainly don't get everything right.
I don't get why it is a big deal, except to Joe and Michael Lichaa, and they really have to man up to the consequences of their actions. Lichaa may be a potential future star, and it is always disappointing to lose potential stars, but he is hardly a star now, hardly a first grader even. So he is no big loss this year.
If Fifita were dropped it would be a big loss this year. If we had 5 international front rowers and one signed elsewhere, we could probably drop that player to give extra time to the others. But we don't, and it probably hurts the team more to lose an international front rower now, than it does to keep him and lose development of some other player.
Yes you want your best team. If the best team obviously includes a player signed to another club, you want to keep them in the top grade. If we were running last by 4 games with 3 games to go, I'd say drop everyone not important to the future and blood players loyal to future years of the club. But otherwise, keep the obviously good player.
If it is not really obvious that a player is best for the team right now, dropping him because he is leaving is not a big deal. Most people wanted Lichaa to have more chances for the future of the team, not for the current team. Since he won't help the current team a great deal more than any other player we could pick in his position, but definitely won't help the future, we drop him. He made a choice, Sharks made a choice, all have to wear the consequences.
It seems pretty straight forward to me.
