only a rumour but.

[jammie]

have been told by a customer at work that the rfl are planning to do what they did with radders and cunningham and top up sams wages to keep him in rl.anyone herd anything or has anyone any thoughts.

[Wigan_forever1985]

He is certainly someone you can market a sport around, if he went there arent many others that have the marketability and talent he has.

But that would be assuming that the RFL have a modicum of intelligence which form past experience seems unlikley

[highland convert]

Sam is just a player, a good one mind but if they bend the rules for one where would it end, Other teams have the same drain. Increase the cap so clubs can play value. While the cap reduces the game to the lowest common denominator we have a problem. What they are admitting is that half the players are not good enough to play top level and the only way they can compete is stop progress in the better teams. Lets face it we are struggling to get a pool of 19 for an international from the UK based players. Says it all when we have to play a reserve league Ozzy to try to furnish an international team. Jim

[DaveO]

Sam is just a player, a good one mind but if they bend the rules for one where would it end, Other teams have the same drain.

Yes other teams do have the same player drain. That is why the last time this was done it just wasn't for Wigan players. At the moment the high profile players going are Eastmond from Saints and Joel from Wigan. Although we expect Sam to be targeted I can't see any others.

It would also end when you had dealt with the players Union are interested in which isn't going to be that many.

Put it this way while we can't as a game afford to pay what RU (or NRL) does to every payer we can more easily replace average players were they to leave than we can special players like Sam.

So if this scheme stopped the likes of Sam leaving but say one of our squad players went it would be far less harmful to Wigan and to the sport as a whole.

Mind you if we could protect the stars I don't think RU would be interested in chasing average squad players at all so if it worked it would stop the player drain completely.

Unfortunately all that said I don't think there will be anything in this rumour. The RFL have their heads in the sand IMO.

[Wigan_forever1985]

totally agree dave, i have no faith in the rfl to address this issue at all like always they will just let it happen

[Matthew]

If he were playing for the whinos then it might be different - I am sure that Hetherington would make sure of it

[Kittwazzer]

With 'Sam's Super Tries', his media career has just begun. I can imagine him being pretty good at this because he has the personality to carry it off.

His pay for this will be completely legit and off cap. And it will disappear if he crosses the dark divide!

[markill]

With 'Sam's Super Tries', his media career has just begun. I can imagine him being pretty good at this because he has the personality to carry it off.

His pay for this will be completely legit and off cap. And it will disappear if he crosses the dark divide!

I was thinking giving him this role on Sky was something of a top-up to keep him in our game. Let's not forget this 3 year can't move to RU clause in his contract too.

I think the RFL should make some sort of financial concession for representative players. Maybe not take them off cap but allow for off-cap bonuses from the club if players play for England at any level and have a reward based system where the RFL reward the clubs for producing international players at all levels.

[nellywelly]

totally agree dave, i have no faith in the rfl to address this issue at all like always they will just let it happen

I also agree the RFL are nob heads, there are many ways to help clubs keep there best players. The idea of having one or two players not counting on the salery cap for one, the caps primery objective is to stop clubs over spending, but if this means our best players leave then gates drop and income goes down. To sum up unless the RFL GETS ITS HEAD FROM OUT OF THE SAND our game will stay as a feeder for RUGBY UNION

[cherrywarrior]

The RFL cant top his wages up BUT, they introduced the new rule about the elite England Players wages so that we could pay him more and still be under the cap (and he got a job on Sky Sports to top his wages up further).