Lol what a stupid post! How can they be coached and managed better than any club??? They had an illegal team e.g better players than everyone else! You can't just take out the salary cap as that is what all the rosters are based on. By the way all systems get abused, In sport or anywhere there is no 100% correct system. As there is always cheats trying to gain an advantage e.g Storm and Dogs etc.
Is a cheat someone who did the wrong thing by the rules or someone who got caught?
In a recent SMH poll 92% of respondents out of more than 1,000 people said they believed more clubs than the Melbourne Storm had cheated the salary cap.
I don't have any doubt in my mind that there are 4 or 5 clubs who at one time or another have bent the rules regarding the cap. Including my club and yours at various times.
Let's look at Melbournes version of cheating.
They underwrote payments from outside companies to ensure that the young players they had nurtured themselves stayed at the Storm rather than moving elsewhere.
Now, correct me if I'm wrong. But I thought the salary cap was introduced to stop the richest clubs from buying up the talented players that poorer clubs developed. Remember the days when Manly used to buy all the youngsters from Souths etc. The cap was designed to level the playing field. Not to ensure that clubs that developed the very best were forced to offload them to other clubs. The Storm are being penalised for successfully developing players and they deserved concessions under the cap for doing so.
The cap itself is flawed, badly flawed and many people have been saying it for a long time.
Had the Melbourne Storm not underwritten the addtional payments the players received the payments would not have been illegal. It was their guarantee that they would back up the payments if the 3rd party deals fell through that is the issue.
Now assume that the third party deals might just be genuine and not a false payment from the Storm via a 3rd party backer and the Storm hasnt actually OVERPAID their players. They've just agreed to do so should the deal go to pooh. Which now they almost certainly HAVE. Ironic that, isn't it?
With Melbourne, you have a club that doesnt have it's own juniors to pick players up from and has to work damn hard scouring the country for new talent.
You have a club that is in foreign territory bringing our great game to Victoria. The only worthwhile expansion of Rugby League in the Southern Hemisphere in 15 years.
You have a club that is given no press coverage in their home town.
A club that gets no television coverage in their home town.
A club that has to recruit players to move away from their friends and family and support networks to play for them and therefore is almost forced to have to pay above market odds to attract players.
So what do we do to assist the growth of the Melbourne Storm? Nothing. We force them to play on an unlevel playing field and when they are successful against all the odds, we're not willing to give them any concessions to maintain the momentum and to grow the sport in Victoria.
Then when they do cheat (and it was almost a given that they'd have to, in order to survive against such odds) we not only belittle all their successes but we call them names, attack them and then attempt to destroy the playing roster they have and possibly the game in Victoria itself.
The NRL and fans of some other clubs are gloating over this issue in a way that sickens me. It's short sighted, childish, beligerant behviour of the worst kind.
Cheating when the odds are so badly stacked against you is not exactly the worst thing in the World. Sometimes you dont have a choice if you want to compete. I think the Storm should be rightly proud of what they've achieved and I think fans of other clubs and the NRL ought to understand that and cut them a little slack.
Had we had the foresight to give them some concessions in the first place as the AFL did with Sydney and Brisbane then this would not have been a problem.
The NRL has been guilty along with the Storm of allowing this problem to evolve. It's not like they werent warned. People have been complaining of the unfairness of the cap for a long time.