Are you naive enough to believe that these players were told "we can only sign you if we get special dispensation for ST from the RFL"?



Au contraire. The fact players are leaving just further highlights what a farce this is.



You call it "a shrewd bit of business" - I prefer to call it "pulling the wool".



I don't intend to fool anyone. I'm merely pointing out that, once again, Wigan have took the RFL and the rest of SL for mugs.

so people are saying to maintain homegrown english talent, you should be forced to cripple the rest of your squad

Maybe it's time someone pointed out that the signings Wigan have made were not AFTER the dispensation was given.

They signed months ago, they were only ANNOUNCED recently. The exceptions are the two young Welsh players Lloyd and Pugsley but as they aren't one of the top 25 earners they don't count on the cap anyway.

As it stands Gelling hasn't signed, so no signings that would impact the cap have been made after the announcement of any dispensation.

Why would you?

Look at the players leaving Wigan, now look at those coming in. Can you honestly say, hand on heart, that they are of equal quality and, by comparison, on equal wages?

If you can, then Wigan were right to go to the RFL for more cap space to keep ST, if not, then Wigan have purely done it as cynical move to gain an unfair financial advantage over the rest of SL knowing full well that the rest of SL won't have the chance to take full advantage of this new loophole before the season starts.

You seem to announce this as fact - is it - or are you just saying it on a messageboard and ergo it must be true?

I'm not going to cut and snip as I'm no good at it but I think it is that simple.

It's obvious someones been sniffing, Wigan wouldn't go to ST and say lets rip up your contract and double your money!
At this point Wigan have a couple of options

Tell him to get stuffed which one way or another is going to suit no-one in RL (Unhappy player, affects Wigan and more importanly affect Eng/GB rugby and bet your life this didn't happen last week! This happened 3/4 months ago the exposure RL has had with the help of his performances has justified the RL thinking about this rule change over the last few months). All those that think they made this rule up last week at the drop of a hat to suit Wigan are living in cloud cuckoo land!

Give him the money he/his agent wants and not sign any replacements for the other players. I'm pretty sure Wigan wouldn't have done that as it's a recipe for disaster.

Speak to the RFL about the rules for Home grown players which benefits mostly all clubs who produce Youth players for England and helps all clubs keep Home grown players and also benefits clubs that produce & keep these players in British RL.

I'm having a slight guess here that they did the latter, and only once the details of the rule changes were sorted did they give ST a wage increase & announce the signing of the New players. If it hadn't been agreed option 1 or 2 would have happened.

SURELY NO-ONE CAN ARGUE THIS ISN'T A GOOD THING?

Cross can't have taken up much cap space, one of the worst foreign signings Leeds made and that's saying something with the dross we have brought over in the past!!

Ok, I'll keep this brief. It IS a GOOD THING that ST remains in the sport. It is also a GOOD THING that this rule exists BUT, and this is my gripe, when you look at the Ins/Outs on the Wigan playing roster, you wonder why they needed this ruling at all?

Also, Wigan continue to persue (sign/announce) players despite already having a squad of players for next year and a fantastic youth set-up waiting in the wings. It just smacks of being totally unfair on the rest of SL. Even you must see that?

How? I'd argue the only clubs not in a position to benefit from the new rules are those which can only blame themselves.

Likely clubs to make us of it:

- Saints
- Leeds
- Hull FC
- Catalans
- Huddersfield
- Warrington
- Wigan

Off the top of my head they are the clubs that will definately be spending to the cap, and also have England players in the team. Bradford, Hull KR can't be far off spending to the cap, and Widnes next year won't be far off although they don't have England players as of yet.

Is that not the majority of the league that will then benefit from this ruling?

No

Because if the rule hadn't come in they would have had to cut their clothe i.e NOT GIVE ST THE MONEY TO KEEP HIM IN THE GAME or GIVE HIM THE MONEY AND THEN RUN A REDUCED SQUAD ROSTER.

Until they knew the rule changed they did neither, what's the problem?

Would you rather they did it the other way and then bleated about the arrogance or stupidity of that move?

Do you think for 1 minute the RL changed this rule last week without consulting any of the other SL Clubs or do you think they have been discussing this for months?

If it's the former then you may as well join the Conspiracy Theory club - if it's the latter then all Wigan have done is taken advantage of a new rule that has been brought in for ALL CLUBS and ALL CLUBS will have known about this potential rule change at the same time.

I know for a fact that this rule may help another SL club keep 1 of their Top stars at their club as the increased wages for the youngsters at that club ( WHo quite rightly are investing a lot of money in juniors to get their system up to speed) meant they needed to offload a Big earner. The big earner was being touted by several SL clubs and now he won't need to leave due to the New rule.

As for Wigan, I would guess that maybe 50% of the wages freed up by Coley/Deacon/Hoffman etc will be taken up by ST's wage increase and the wages of Flower/Dudson. The other will go to the incremental step up in wages for the youngsters coming through such as Crosby/Hughes/Tomkins/King/Mellor etc etc I could go on a lot more.

The 100k that has come in Plus the money freed from the released players will be used to allow the youngsters wages to increase and allow Wigan to keep ST.

How do you know for instance that other clubs haven't had youngsters waiting on this extra 100k ruling before being given new/improved contracts and if it hadn't come in they would have had unhappy youngsters or players leaving?

I know of 1 youngster at Warrington personally who after the ruling last week was fast tracked ontp the higher Youth players wages. He wouldn't have left if it hadn't happened but it certainly pleased him and helps him to concentrate on is future at Warrington rather than look elsewhere.

I think the point that is trying to be made is that it is only wigan that will directly benefit from the ruling THIS season.

It's too late in the day for any of the above mentioned teams to alter their transfer policy accordingly, as most have signed players already... wigan on the other hand appear to have held off signing anyone until this ruling has been passed.

Over the next few season im sure that there are quite a few teams that will benefit....at the moment though it would appear to be heavily weighted in wigans favour for the coming season.

Well technically the way Wigan have benefited from it is by giving Sam Tomkins the payrise, and (rumoured) to be giving one to Josh Charnley as well. What's stopping Wire/Saints giving new contracts to Roby/Lomax/Atkins?

I think the misconception is that people think that (were the exception not to happen) we wouldn't be signing Dudson, Flower or whoever else. The reality is that they were already signed (just not announced), so the benefit Wigan have got is that Tomkins now has a (hopefully) airtight new deal for 3 years, with Charnley soon behind. Nothing to stop other teams benefitting from that THIS year.

Dont get me wrong.... i think its a great idea.... im all for it...... my club is going to benefit hugely from the new rule over the next 3/4 seasons.... But surely you can see what people are saying.....

its the way its been done. Surely you wigan fans can see that this contract signing was announced at the same time as the salary cap change was aired to us via the the press, by IL ! and has effectively freed up a load of cap space for you.

the gripe is that wigan have engineered a salary caps change (as good as it is for a few other clubs) that benefits them before anyone else.

I can see why some people are a bit narked by it.

Absolutely, said this from the start the RFL have made themselves look stupid, especially enabling Wigan to announce the changes making it look like Wigan have done what they wanted.


But there is no way that other Chairman didn't know about this change as it was being discussed as well, I highly doubt it's been a big secret between the RFL and IL, this won't have gone ahead without a yes from the rest of the league I'd imagine.

And it can benefit anyone else now, how many players have Saints signed this year already? They are well within their rights to give Lomax/Roby/Gaskell/Foster pay rises in line with the new scheme on top of the few signings you've already made, exactly the same as Wigan have done with Tomkins/Charnley.

Wigan haven't used this extension to sign the new players, they were signed long ago and only just announced, Tomkins and subsequently Charnleys new deals weren't. I fail to see how this is only benefitting Wigan in the short term, all clubs can do exactly the same as Wigan NOW if they so choose to

its fair play to wigan from me...no complaints whatsoever about this decision regarding the salary cap.

the timing was the issue..... im not bothered though as the wire will beat be beating them home and away AGAIN in the league next season