He is wanting to be released from the Bulldogs and isnt ruling out a return to Super League.

Any thoughts?

Link?

Definitely true (That it's a story, not necessarily that it's factually true). I saw it on Australian TV today whilst messing about on Kodi. Apparently dismayed that the club has retained Des Hasler, been stripped of the captaincy and has thrown the toys out of the pram and demanded to be released from his contract. They mentioned the Bulldogs are more than willing to do that, but would much prefer to not release him to an NRL rival. They didn't take it too seriously however.

[url=http://www.fantasyfootballnuts.org/james-graham-set-to-leave-bulldogs/Only web link I can find is this, but it's not a proper sports site[/url

interesting!

If James wants to realise his true potential then he'll come to the Wire.
Any where else would be a downward step.

why wire? seasonal chokers isnt much of a pull



saints would be first in line

I'm sure I read somewhere that the Bulldogs were removing the captaincy from Graham as it was harming his game.

he is reportedly on $700k per year,thats over £400k over here,no chance he will come back as there is no one that can pay him that much. Other nrl teams are interested and they will pay him more and not less no doubt. I would class this as off season rubbish and file it in the same drawer as the Makinson or Percival to wigan rumours that have gone around.

We can't compete with wages like in Australia for top players like James, same with RU here, England players get around £300,000 per year and clubs pay the same to England players as well as sponsorship?

Seasonal chokers? Hardly. Plenty of seasons where they're too poor to get into any choking situations

Graham isn't going to move to Union, so we don't need to price him out of that bracket. If he's leaving Canterbury, and it's a big IF, it might be possible. I'm sure other NRL clubs are going to be interested, but I don't see the Bulldogs liking that unless they get paid, which is unusual in the NRL. If, at 31, Graham decides it's time to come home, we'd be in first place. We'd be able to pay him more than other clubs wouldn't we, as he'd count as our player, or does that exemption only kick in if the player is already at the club?

The club needs to monitor this, if it's in any way true, very closely. Can you imagine the ill-feeling there would be towards the club if such an iconic player was allowed to join a rival club? Warrington have their marquee spot free and Wigan must surely have space for him too. Either of those would be a PR disaster. The Luke Douglas signing would suddenly look a lot less solid if Jammer really was on the market and we'd spent the cap elsewhere.

Did I say that? I was stating that the UK RL set up is so far behind the NRL & RU now in salary rates, nothing else!

As far as i am aware the first 175k wouldn't count on our cap IF he came back as he came through our system( and i don't for a moment think he will ) Any other SL team only the first 100k wouldn't count on their cap.

Other way around.

IF he came back to Saints and IF the club used the marquee rule he would count for 100k on Saints cap.
IF he signed for another SL club and IF that club used the marquee rule he would count for 175k on their cap.

It's not happening though.

Let's for one minute believe that he would resign for Saints and he was to be paid a similar amount of money (remembering that money is the driver for most people), which players would you release to get under the cap?

I,m not sure if a James Graham 2017/2018 would be a good move, he would have played lots of minutes in 10 years by then and could be approaching burn out with the usual age related possible injuries.

None, we have quite a bit of cap space free after missing out on Lewis, and as posted above would only count for 100k. The only issue from a playing perspective would be fitting Graham, Amor, Walmsley, Douglas and Walker into a match day 17.

Does Chris Sandow think the same?

You should be able to sign a superstar with that amount of money available. Many teams play with five props in there 17 now.

On his way to Manly allegedly.

He won't play for saints again

Agree with this. Couple more seasons in Aus then when he's not the player he was he will end up at Warrington for silly money

Regards

King James