See he's complaining already about the salary cap. Apparently they are 'on it' or 'over it'.

if they're over it maybe he should have kept that one to himself or is he worried a 'Saracens' is lurking in the background

They've hardly got any players either!

Maybe they're just special

If Sonny Bill is on a special deal with dispensation, where has the money gone, when you look at their squad? Olpherts? Wilkins? Singleton? Is that really a cap-busting squad?

It has to be said, however, that the cap needs looking at. It has stayed the same for too long, and when you look at the cap in union and Australia, it's no wonder we can't attract decent players.

Perhaps keep the cap more or less the same, so that average players can't start demanding salaries they don't deserve, but perhaps increase the marquee players to four, so that we have a chance of attracting stars. Pretty soon, all of the England squad will be playing in Australia. It degrades our game

4 marquee players ,think it will turn S L in to a four team league again

I dont agree with you at all.
How many clubs actually have 2 marque players now, less than half ?
And when you think that, despite his eye watering contract SBW will only count 100k ?

There is another issue here, which is the exchange rate being used.
We know that Catalan were doing very well on this a little while ago, when they were ale to spend more than £250k more than the other SL clubs, which was due to the exchange rate having been set at 1.45 euros to the £ (I think).

Currently you get 1.65 - 1.70 dollars to the £ but, I wonder what rate is being used for s/c purposes.

Finally, although Toronto is a magnificent city, I wonder how many players actually want to go over there.

Ricky Leutele, their centre is on an absolute fortune.

Edit: £430,000 if Google is to be believed, the highest paid centre in Rugby League.

That's the risk we need to avoid, I agree, but it has to be re-examined in some way, because as a game we can't attract anyone, apart from those at the end of their careers, and we have seen a drain away from the game of British stars. I would have loved to spent the last ten years watching the likes of James Graham and Sam Burgess. It might have meant a four-team league then, perhaps, but there has to be a way of keeping things competitive whilst attracting stars and retaining stars.

One of the ways to retain players would be to offer positions within the game once they have finished playing.
The sports lost endless players to union who go on to coach . That's one reason why ru improved on the field. While ever we insist on promoting australian 2nd team coaches to super l and international positions we will see players at the end of careers disappearing to union or seeking employment outside the game.

Think hes got a nerve, honestly, in asking this.

I do though agree with s lot of people that we need to increase the existing cap.

We will never compete with the NRL on this, so theres no point in my eyes, trying to. Wasnt there something in the news though a while back that NRL clubs were collectively in debt for several million dollars. You could ask the question, is the NRL cap set too high?

I can't remember what the current cap is, but the last time I checked ours was either 1.8 or 1.9 million. Maybe this needs increasing to something like. 2.2, with a steady annual increase.

If we are though wanting to retain our own, them, maybe we also need to look at reducing the overseas quota, gradually too.

I'd get rid of the cap. It's there to level things out but the same teams win the trophies time after time so it's not really doing what it was brought into do.

Add to that clubs still going bust/having financial difficulties with the cap in place and you wonder what the point it. Clubs will be financially mismanaged with or without a cap.

It was fetched in to help control the club's from trying to keep up with the rich elite at the top of the league and stop them from going bust but ironically it was Leeds the richest club in league that chose to break them rules for fear of being relegated add that to the 2006 season and Wigan attempt to stay afloat it seems to be the ones with the most money wanting to spend more

Although the cap should have increased year on year from the outset, we still come back to just how many clubs are spending up to the current cap and using the 2 marque signings.
There are probably 3, maybe 4 clubs that are hitting the pay ceiling, plus, Toronto.
The bottom line is that, in relation to RU and NRL, Super League just hasn't got the income to compete for the best players and even if we had, there aren't too many top Aussie players that would forego their chance of playing Origin, just to come over here.

The game needs to find ways of generating extra income before it can make any serious change to the cap and the next TV deal will be very interesting and if there is any reduction in the deal, could have profound effects on the game and further damage our chances in competing with Union and the NRL.

Sort of my point though, it's not stopping clubs from going bust. Seem to remember an interview with MC talking about deliberately not spending to cap as the money isnt there- shows he could have the club spending beyond its means even with a cap in place.

And as far Leeds going over it, chronic mismanagement because how that squad was being paid anywhere near the cap is beyond my comprehension having watched it week in week out...

If you remember back to the pre Super League days, when Wigan won everything, with Widnes grabbing silverware when they failed, it wasn't just Wigan that were in strife, the whole professional game almost imploded.
The fact that some clubs have still gone pop, although most have returned, doesn't mean that the situation would be better without the cap.
I think you need to look a little deeper and to some of the threats from HMRC who have become vexed about pro sports clubs going bust and therefore not paying their tax bills.

What do you think would happen without the cap, with certain clubs left to their own devices and would it really help us compete with Union or the NRL ??

The playing field is more even than it used to be.
We are an exception but before the cap Wigan could trounce a team in the top 5 by 50 points.
We now have a situation where lower teams can beat top teams, just not in the finals yet.
For me the cap works but it should be deployed differently to help manage teams but also let top clubs buy/keep top players.

It doesn't bother me at all if Warrington can sign a top player that we can't afford. I wouldn't want them to be able to sign 13 of them though.

Increase Cap. Keep and maybe increase marquee. Allowance for home grown players.

Wasn't the original cap something to do with you can only spend a certain % of your income up to a limit of 1.8 million?

Widnes absolutely imploded trying to keep up their success in the 80's then Wigan went bust after they dominated the 90's. I seem to think the cap was brought in because of the state Wigan got themselves into.

Tell BM where to get off, he knew the rules regarding salary cap, he should have cut his teams cloth accordingly.

Couldn't agree more Jinjer

It actual shows it’s a lot more difficult to run an expansion team because no one wants to travel across the globe to play and not get well paid. This alone shows that maybe expansion clubs that far away isn’t a good idea. As other people have posted getting rid of the cap isn’t good for the league as you may as well split the league into a four team league and the rest in another which would be the death of super League. There should be no dispensation for TW as there is promotion and relegation which would be unfair to any team going down who are abiding by normal rules.