An increase in the cap of 2m. The Club spent approx. 1m on Hunt - though Millward says it is a lot less than that - and increased Widdops salary by approx. 200k. Clearly the cap increase more than covered the spend on the halves.
Dugan was reported to be on 700k. He asked for 1m and Millward offered him a reported 750k - 850k. Dugan signed with Cronulla for 700k. Again, keeping Dugan was put down as a cost thing however, it is clear it was more of a Field for fullback thing. The Club is right to renew its roster little by little each season but to spin that Dugan's loss was due to cap pressure is rubbish.
Then there is Packer. A key part of our 'power plan' and we let him go because he wanted 4 years instead of 3. With no believable reason for such miss-management, all I can put it down to is Millward's complete lack of skills in dealing with complex contract negotiations.
Regarding Dugan, table the offer and if need be negotiate but surely within a month if no deal can be struck, pull the offer by advising Dugan he is free to find a new home.
All along the theme of 'we want to sort Dugan's contract first' when dealing with the Packer contract. For goodness sakes, one is a forward, the other a back and the only connection I can make is that they are both currently key players in our 'power plan'. Surely the way to go was to put Dugan aside because no headway was being made. Sign Packer on a 3 year plan with an option in the Club's favour for a further year. In the absence of the Tigers offer, Packer would surely have signed under those terms. Yet Millward could not/would not move in a timely way on this deal.
Cap wise the Club has to be in a very favourable position. As I said the cap increase is approx. 2m and we now have let go Dugan and Packer making it over 3m in credits. We have only added Hunt to the roster so far and have upgraded Widdop and our forwards - in my estimations - for approximately a total cost of 2m. On these figures we are still 1m ahead of our 2017 cap position with Lafai, Mann and Milne still to sign.
My hope is that Millward let's go some fringe first graders and replaces them with his promising juniors. I also hope he signs Lafai, Mann and Milne mainly because they are good first graders and can competently perform at first grade level.
Let competition determine who will hold first grade positions but a least have a squad of great first graders to be the players competing.
