If Mr Diamond or Sale claim they haven't done anything wrong, then why have they agreed to compensate Cas for some of their legal fees.

Official Sale Sharks statement here :- www.salesharks.com/news/5197.php#.WUqh6WgrLcs

Official Sale Sharks statement here :- www.salesharks.com/news/5197.php#.WUqh6WgrLcs

To me it looks like Sale's intention was never to sign the player without paying a fee, basically it's cost them an extra £100k for the legal fees over and above the £200k they originally offered Cas. So my take on it is if a player wants to go, and you've been offered a sensible figure for him, then it's easier all round to take the offer. Maybe not the most principled stance, but then settling for the original offer plus legal fees isn't all that principled either!

Basically to remove uncertainty the risks associated with the case created. Both sides have actually demonstrated thinking in line with modern behavioural economics theory. Sale faced the risk that they would lose and would have to pay £600k (£500k Cas valuation plus 100k legal costs), so they settled for half their exposure which was the £300k (£200k Sale valuation plus £100k legal costs). Cas faced the risk that they would get nothing for a player the market valued at £200k (Sale's bid was the highest bid from the market) plus incur an extra £100k of legal costs if they lost. So Cas basically removed their risk and got the market value of the player with no legal costs lost (even if Cas valuation was above market value). What we don't really know is the probabilities of the various outcomes had it gone to a legal decision, which makes it hard to know who got the better deal, if indeed either club did (I'm ignoring the various moral arguments on either side here). Cross code rugby disputes as a case study in behavioural economics! Who'da thunk it?

Just makes it a bit easier for clubs without the cash for an expensive legal fight to have something in writing that makes it a lot more clear cut.

Diamond seems to forget what he has said previously and what was published as part of the court case.
An email was sent from Diamond to Steve Gill withdrawing the 200k offer and reducing this to 50k. I assume Diamond has forgotten this, as he now claims Castleford have not gained financially by taking the case through the legal process. Even the most basic maths says that the difference between Sale's offer (50k) and the settlement (in excess of 200k) means Castleford have gained financially.
Diamond is also on record in the press as saying Sale were entitled to sign Solomona for free as he had retired from RL. Given his previous comments, he therefore looks at idiot claiming that a 200k (plus legal costs) is a successful outcome for Sale.

Is it not clear-cut already? Signing an RL contract clearly prohibits playing another sport (one would hope).
If a player is going to walk away from a contract, he's not going to worry about the content of said contract.
Unless of course a punitive financial penalty is included as a clause in the contract that the player would be personally liable to pay (perhaps 10x salary) should the player breach their contract.

Tigers got 205K for DS - so that is a decent result IMO although I was expecting something in the region of 300K.

The big result for me though is how much Sale Sharks have had to pay-out.
205K plus both legal teams at 110K each. 425K - thats one hell of a bill.

Quote: Wildthing "How innocent and professional they have been. Not. Grubby club and grubby people!'" Indeed. It seems it's not just us RL folks here. A few Sale Sharks fans think their club are very unprofessional in how they have dealt with the matter as well:- www.rugbynetwork.net/boards/read ... 4,16029581

Quote: Wildthing "How innocent and professional they have been. Not. Grubby club and grubby people!'" Indeed. It seems it's not just us RL folks here. A few Sale Sharks fans think their club are very unprofessional in how they have dealt with the matter as well:- www.rugbynetwork.net/boards/read ... 4,16029581

Sounds like sour grapes from Sale and Diamond.

What should we make of this?

Given the £50k offered by SD for a quick deal and then him bragging about getting DS for free I'd say Sale are out of pocket by at least £150k on the transfer fee alone.

The whole statement smacks of infant school playground noise and makes them look foolish, churlish, unprofessional and clearly not prepared to hold their hand up at their own skullduggery that caused the issue in the first place.

The simplest way to show how nonsensical Sale's position is would be to ask how they would respond if any of their squad did what Solomona tried to do - retire from RU and walk away from their contract, straight to another pro team. Even more bizarrely it suggests they would be Ok with that happening if a player 'retired' from living in the north and simply left Sale and signed for an RU club in the south. The logic they are implying can only lead to that being their view.

Oddly enough, I suspect the next contracted player that wants to leave Sale won't be allowed to just walk away.