Yeah i know that, i just enjoy watching the anti-McDermott brigade get their knickers in a twist when you criticise their beloved Tony. Especially when people make out all was rosey during Smith's reign when it wasn't and that some are so hell bent on not giving McDermott any credit at all that they'd say Smith deserves more credit for the last 2 successes rather than the actual present coach.

Except it's doubtful anyone has said those things.

Smith's ability is to produce good entertaining rugby. Excellent defensive patterns and attacking structures that utilises the full width of the pitch and in both directions. He's a quality coach who produces entertaining teams who score freely.

He's brought success to two massively under achieving clubs and turned the fortunes around at another. His personal CV is full having coached teams to GF, CC, LLS and WCC.

A fact clearly reflected in his trophy haul from 2005 to date.

And the rest.



Does the live salary cap allow for the obvious pre-loading of contracts in such a manner? To be honest I thought there were regulations in place to prevent such abuses.

I can see the issues around backloading a contract, I can’t see what the issue the game would have with front-loading the contract like that would be?

As far as I am aware there is no provision to pay a player more in the first than last year of the contract, im not sure what the expected gain from there being so would be?

The salary cap regs do say that for cap audit purposes, reward for services across the length of a contract can be spread pro-rata between the salary cap years covered by that contract, rather than being based on when the salary was received by the player.

So if you agreed to pay a player £100k in year one, then £50k per year for years two, three and four, the RFL could interpret that as being £62.5k per year for each of the four salary cap years.

It's how they deal with signing bonuses for cap purposes, they pro-rata them across the length of the contract.

Signing bonuses can definitely be treated that way but there isn’t any specific clause saying that salaries will be. In fact the only mention of it within the SC rules is that salaries may be looked at pro-rata if the auditor deems that the payment was accrued in that year. From the wording of the rules it appears that front-loading is permissible as long as it isn’t particularly egregious or detrimental to the player.

[ithe RSCM may decide to treat a Club’s liability to a Player for salary and/or specific payments or benefits (including but not limited to the specific cases set out in Clauses 5.6.6 and 5.6.7, below) as Accruing on a pro rata basis across all or part of the term of the Player’s Playing Contract, if the RSCM believes that such payment or benefit is being made in consideration for services rendered across such term.

In reaching a decision, the RSCM will act reasonably and will take into consideration:

the reasonableness of the schedule of payments and/or benefits and whether, in any given Salary Cap Year, the Player’s welfare and interests would be prejudiced by the proposed arrangements, and

the value of any termination payment (or other benefits) received by the Player from a previous club immediately before signing for the Club. The previous club may be in any country and of either rugby code and the details of any such payment must be supplied to the RSCM in writing.[/i

Now i would think that (using my completely made up example) the RFL could decide the schedule of payments unreasonable, you could easily argue that schedule of payments perfectly reasonable for a player who is declining, as well being to the benefit of the player by offering the safety of a guaranteed longer contract at their age. Maybe for Kirke the figures may seem a little excessive, but certainly for Peacock for example, you could argue that his market value was high, rapidly declining and as an ageing player he was benefitting from the security of a guaranteed longer contract.

Saying that I expect we will see a pretty significant overhaul of the SC in 2015 anyway and it will all be a bit irrelevant by then.

McGuire will be back in 8 weeks max. according to McDermott.

Vickery is a fabulous winger and deserves his repeated selection. according to McDermott.

Don`t try and change the subject whilt they are debating who is the best coach Leeds have had.
What do you think this subject is all about?

Like most subjects, it's about his determination to post things that shout "LOOK AT ME EVERYONE", irrespective of anything else in the thread.