The near $1 million gulf between the salaries of the NRL's highest-paid coaches and those at the bottom of the pay scale is tipped to narrow as a cap on football department spending looms as an equalisation measure as important as the salary cap under the new broadcast deal.
While John Grant's future was a focal point of day-long tense talks between the Australian Rugby League Commission and disgruntled club bosses on Tuesday, a threshold on spending outside the salary cap and how it affects the NRL's 16 coaches looms as a major talking point next year.
Some of the competition's shrewdest clipboard carriers, headed up by premiership-winning coaches Craig Bellamy (Storm) and Wayne Bennett (Broncos), command salaries north of $1 million while the NRL's cash-strapped clubs fork out pay packets far inferior for their brains trust.
The issue has long been a source of consternation between the clubs, who are heavily restricted and scrutinised on how much they can spend on their full-time playing squad but have had an unfettered ability to invest in support mechanisms such as coaches to attract the game's elite to their club.
While it is unlikely a cap on football department expenditure will greatly diminish the earning capacity of the game's top coaches, it will keep it level and allow other clubs who have survived above the breadline to be more aggressive in pursuing the best mentors on the market.
That means the contract values of the game's lowest paid coaches will be lifted to haul them closer to the dollars commanded by the likes of Bellamy, Bennett and Bulldogs boss Des Hasler.
Spending on areas such as support staff, sports science and centres of excellence will be under the microscope under the new football department cap, but some of the clubs which are willing to absorb costs in that area such as the Broncos are not expected to have to suddenly cut spending.
It is instead anticipated that clubs which don't spend anywhere as much on off-field operations will gradually claw back the margin in football department spending once they receive grants at 130 per cent of the salary cap in 2018, gradually inching their way to parity with the premiership heavyweights.
http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/...ne-bennett-back-to-field-20161221-gtfl19.html
