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Why am I not surprised?

I can think of only five clubs who would vote yes to a rise.

Tail and dog comes to mind, again.

They need to raise the cap in line with inflation at least.

Wonder if anything was said regarding weetabix at the meeting?

Well, not really, not if 9 of the 14 vote for it to stay the same.

Ultimately the right decisions need to be made for all clubs not just for a few who have plenty of resources.

Maybe but three years without a rise is not good. You can only lower standards by doing that surely?

Depends. Money is tight, there are plenty of people not getting pay rises at the moment.

The clubs who want to progress are being held back.

The cap wouldn't bother me as much if players brought through your academy were discounted, I can't believe the RFL haven't come up with some idea to encorporate this into the cap.

The fact is that none of us know the details of the vote.

Pretty much all clubs are losing money, if they decided to increase the cap by an extra £200k then the clubs that lift their salaries will simply lose another £200k per year, as there aren't that many extra incom streams knocking around.

Perhaps even the top teams who are at the cap limit don't want to stretch things at the moment in this recession.

Possibly. Commercially clubs might be feeling the pinch but attendance wise the crowds have held up well or risen during the financial climate, so I wouldn't say things are so desperate.







Aye thats been my argument for a long time as well.

a cap that does not rise along side inflation will lead to may of our better players leaving to play union. there SC is nearly 2.5 times the size (in england) and in france it is £7.1 million.

no matter if you play for quins or wigan, when you go to get a new contract, and you get told that you cannot earn any more than 3 years previous you will get a little annoyed. if inflation was 4% each year for those 3 years you would need £1.13 for every £1 you earned in your old crontract to MAINTAIN the lifestyle you had previously. so in effect that would be telling players to take a pay cut every season.

if i was a player i know what i would be doing, learning how to ruck and maul because i could earn 2.5 times more playing RU in england or 4.3 times more playing RU in france.

perhaps they should base the cap on average body fat percentage ?

walker in for feka ?

Or perhaps even the NRL.

Plenty of clubs have had their crowds go down. Sponsors have declined and costs will have increased during the last couple of years.

The fact that they are already losing money backs up that things aren't great (although that may be a commercial decision), and extending the SC would simply pile further losses on to many clubs.

I'm not disagreeing that there should be an increase, I just don't always think it's as clear-cut as some club's fans make out.

Players can get pay rises. It is up to their club to juggle their playing staff, as players are off contract at the end of every season.

Some RU clubs are losing millions per year. Fortunately for them they have people to foot the bill, so comparing to their salary cap is irellevant really.

just because the cap is raised it doesn't mean clubs have to spend to the limit

although i do agree, the rfl/sl do need to come up with a discount for bringing your own talent through, not just keeping hold of a player for 10 years!

They should base the cap on turnover then it would provide clubs that are being held back a chance to grow. The better the competition the bigger the sky money would get and all clubs would benefit. Relegation and promotion should come back too imo, the teams at the bottom of SL and at the top of the Championship are stagnating because theyve got nothing to aim for. Maybe they could have a relegation/promotion playoff.

Yes, but to give someone a rise you need to eliminate or reduce another players wage, not great if you have for example just won the title

What do you think of the below Dave?

yes single players can get pay rises, but think about it as a whole.

again say inflation had been 4% for the past 3 seasons. in season 1 you could spend £1.65 mill. in real terms that would be £1.856 mill by the end of the 3rd season. but yet you can still only pay £1.65 mill. which means some of the talent is going to leave the SL, and this happens to all clubs.

the thing that i think has helped recently is the league growing by 2 teams. it has helped soften the blow of inflation because at the start of the last 3 seasons there was a total (in SL) of £19.8 mill to be spent on wages. now there is £23.1 to spent as a whole. which means players can still get a deal at another SL club and the talent can spread between the clubs. but when the effect of the two clubs being added rubs off i do think players will look to leave, unless the cap rises, it doesnt have to be massive, just a small amount.

IIRC Leeds turnover hit £10m last time. THe likes of Wigan, Saints and Wire turnover between £4.5-£5m. Are you saying it would be good for the game if Leeds could spend double the amount we do, and potentially five times the amount that someclubs can afford to?

I do agree with yourpoint about looking at the total SL wage cap as a whole. If this is not increasing then it can be a problem. One of the benefits of the cap was to spread the talent, however if this means that there simply is nowhere for players to go then yes it needs looking at. We have no evidence of this happening though.

So how did Leeds manage to double the turnover of Saints, Wire and ourselves? I didnt think there would be so much difference.

As more experienced players leave then you should bring in younger (cheaper) lads, and promoting some of those ex-young (cheap) lads to be the higher paid players. This is natural progression and it is how Saints and Leeds have done it, and the likes of Wigan are now reaping the rewards from this (very few top end signings in recent years).

I agree with incentivising home-grown and academy graduates through the Salary Cap.

I would give clubs different caps based on how many overseas players they have.

God knows, just what I read, and I wonder whether there is something to do with the Union club in there, but I wouldn't have thought so.

They have had the highest crowds, who pay for the most expensive seats in the game, and they have had plenty of finals etc. to increase revenue.

Warrington have said in the past that their turnover is between £4.5-5m and it wasn't so long ago that Wigan were at a similar amount, although this may have now improved.

Leeds (legally) manipulate the income from league and union to the best tax and other legal advantages. Similarly Whelan (again legally) surpressed Wigan's turnover and diverted it into his other companies for tax purposes.