The game just doesn't generate enough interest over here mate, RL will never be in a position to pay a player £200 grand a week,
Joel Tomkins reputed to be offered £400,000 a YEAR to play union at Saracens.

When all clubs can afford to pay full cap and break even at the end of the year then up it. Until then don't, it's not like it will make a blind bit of difference to one or two players being offered silly money from RU.

Much bigger impact than RU will be when the NRL cap goes up and they get two more expansion teams. Then we will see a dramatic reduction in 1st grade NRL players moving to SL, this will leave a big gap in clubs rosters from 2014 onwards.

Quote: Him "Yes that would be the yearly wage of all the players, except the poster I was responding to clearly stated only a months wages would solve the problem. Excellent reading there Visual representation of US debt, just to cheer up your Thursday. usdebt.kleptocracy.us/ Not quite as good UK version too... t.co/uWTr4Grf

Quote: Him "Yes that would be the yearly wage of all the players, except the poster I was responding to clearly stated only a months wages would solve the problem. Excellent reading there Visual representation of US debt, just to cheer up your Thursday. usdebt.kleptocracy.us/ Not quite as good UK version too... t.co/uWTr4Grf

Welcome to the wonderful world of Damo-Leeds logic. Happy for tens of thousands of poor and working class people to be ripped off on ticket and shirt prices etc so that 11 people from poor and working class backgrounds can earn more money than they ever dreamed of

There won't be any limit on what Football clubs pay their players.
The only thing which appears to be an effort to bring income and expenditure into line is the uefa fair play rule and that has its limits as City have just proved with their naming right deal on the stadium.

The top 20 European clubs tried to introduce a salary cap well over a decade ago and wrote to the EU for its approval.
The EU told them to forget it, it was illegal as a restraint of trade, they, reportedly told them don't bother writing again or phoning about it!

I'd just love the owner of Barrow to go to the courts over the sanctions which were imposed for the breech of the SC bring a restraint of trade!
I wonder if the RFL would even defend the SC through the courts!

Please explain just how a salary cap can be construed as a restraint of trade?

IIRC restraint of trade applies to an individual, nothing I can see in SC rules is restraining anyone, unless of course, a player were to prove that if the salary cap was not in place, he could demand and seriously expect to be paid £1.65 millions per year

Also there is the tricky issue of an RFL regulation that clubs cannot sue the RFL. Well they can, but they are in breach of RFL regulations by doing so and so would receive further punishment such as the club being de-registered.

I would imagine it's also difficult for a club to take the RFL to court over rules and regulations that they agreed to.

Surely they would only need to prove a player couldn’t earn whatever it is a club was prepared to offer because of the salary cap.

If a club was prepared to offer me £300k but couldn’t because of the salary cap, it matters not that is because other people are paid other amounts, it is my ability to earn my market worth that is impacted, not to mention it unfairly restricts my market value to start with.

That doesnt apply to players though, nor does it disgraced directors who have been banned for 7 years.

But the director has not been impacted by the salary cap since his wage does not count so I would imagine he would not be able to sue the RFL over the salary cap itself. He could, presumably, attempt to sue them with regards to his own personal punishment and protest it was too harsh but again that is not really suing the RFL over the salary cap as restrain of trade but over not applying appropriate punishment in his eyes.

As you say it doesn't apply to players, but it would take a very brave/stupid player to try it since it would cost them a lot in the short term and there's still no guarantee he'd win since the salary cap is at £1.6m and he might have to try and prove he was worth more than that and could command a wage of more than that were there no salary cap in place. I note your reply to Codead but I don't think that's strictly true since nothing is stopping Wigan, for instance, allocating all their salary cap to Sam Tomkins and paying him £1.6m, they simply made a choice it wasnt worth having only 1 senior player compared to 25 on lower wages.

Well it does on two counts, firstly it is a cartel conspiring to keep the market value artificially low, which in and of itself could be challenged regardless of any player proving anything at all. Secondly it is unreasonable for a professional sports team to pay only one player, there is no chance that any team could, by the laws of the RFL, pay only one player. Sam Tomkins cant take to the field on his own and there are restrictions on amateur players playing in SL. All a player would need to prove is that his wage was restricted by the SC. There is plenty stopping Wigan paying Sam Tomkins £1.65m, just as there is plenty stopping Sam Tomkins earning £500k. The fact the reason for that is that they have paid more to other players isn’t really relevant, there is a restriction on how much Sam Tomkins can earn.

There would likely be no argument over whether it is a restraint of trade by anybody (since it clearly is) though there could be an argument over whether or not it is reasonable. Though as the players get nothing in return for this sacrifice im not sure how anyone could argue it was.

A swear jar from Tim Howard would at least be a start though.