At least Eastmond saw out his contract, unlike some.

Hardly played, showed little commitment and you get bugger all for him...

Can I state that this rule does sod all to stop any alleged player drain.

The problem is RL has less revenue than RU.

This effective increasing of the cap does nothing what so ever to increase revenues.

All we have done is make it more pricey for a few chosen RL players to be prized away. Once again we have confused hype with the health of the game.

Does this expand viewership
does this expand the geographical nature of the game
does it increase the tv deal
does it stop fans in Wigan from leaving Rl for union or the NRL

In my opinion it does none of the above. What we have done is short term and short focused and as with all simple solutions creates a minor feel good feeling for a few influential people but does nothing to address underlying issues.

Can some one tell me how many people have actaully stopped watching SL either in person or on tv when individuals find alternate employment to RL?

A far bigger impact on crowds . sponsorship and revenue streams is the ressession. Other than the ressession viewing and attendance figures still performe well.

I'm sure lots will say something had to be done to save x y z player because they are important to the game. But I'm yetto see hard evidence of fans following players as individuals rather than clubs.

But it allows clubs with the ability to spend over the cap the room to offer extra payments to one star player, such as Tomkins so yes it does help in stopping the player drain. Generally the teams who can't spend up to the cap won't have the star players so it won't effect them too much.

Do you really think 300k will stop Union if they really want a player.The RFU have coffers deeper than any RL club and if they wanted a player they would open those coffers and get him. £1 million a year would be easy for the right player.

This rule does nothing about the real issue.

i don't know why they didn't just raise the cap by 300k and save all this myther.

Without reading through 7 pages of people complaining has this 'rule' change been communicated? I'd only have a problem if it was a 1 off for a Wigan player if the same rule applies to all teams in a fair manner I have no issue. Sam Tomkins staying in League is good for the game (even if he has a dubious attitude at time)

The timing of the rule change is a major issue for me (I'm presuming it's only just been introduced, rather than all the other SL clubs choosing not to take advantage of it until now). Off the top of my head:

Saints have lost Graham and Eastmond, both of whom are homegrown and both of whom could be considered marquee players.

Salford have lost Ratchford. Homegrown and, you could argue, was Salford's top player and therefore 'marquee'.

I'm sure the ability to chuck more money at these players to persuade them to re-sign with their respective clubs would have been welcomed. Maybe they'd have gone anyway.
Maybe not; money talks, ask Joel.

And Sam, for that matter... all this talk of loyalty, but it takes a new rule allowing him to earn record breaking amounts of cash to persuade him to stick out an extra 3 years (for which he was already contracted).

But what if there is a star player at a club that cannot afford to spend as Wigan clearly can? What happens then? Does this sop to Wigan stop such a player from being enticed to RU or the NRL? The salary cap was brought in to stop exactly what Wigan are now doing.

Wigan and Leeds. The biggest mouths in English RL. When they yell jump, the RFL asks how high and then wets its collective pants.

Bingo.

But then that would have been slated as too small a rise...

The only real thing wrong thing about this new rule is that wigan have come out and informed us about it.

Ineptness of the highest order from the RFL, letting people find out about it via a new contract for sam tomkins and a direct quote from IL.

Ineptness from the RFL that they allowed Wigan to do this. But then, the RFL is inept in so many ways.

I wonder what all the other 'stakeholders' think of this decision? It's going to make a nightmare out of contract negotiations.

i think this has been agreed with the other clubs.... i just think its a ridiculous way for fans to find out about it.

Totally agree on the contract negotiations.... all the top level players will be looking at tomkins salary and thinking 'i fancy some of that'

Also.....I wonder how all these arrogant aussie players are going to react to being paid less than an english player in an 'inferior' league.

deffo going to be some interesting developments regarding salaries over the next few years.

I think we will see many junior players who rate themselves much better than they really are at this stage throwing their dummies out of the pram and threats to go to Union! Still can't work out were all the extra money will come from? no announcement yet of a Super League sponsor for 2012?

Somebody told me last week that it is going to be Heinz, and that it wouldn't be announced until after the four nations had finished.