I don't think that this is a bad move by Saints. If Thompson was refusing to take a pay cut, as has been claimed, then that sows unrest within the club. Add to this that you can cut your wage bill this year and bring cash in then it's a good business. I know that it's early days but I think that people will look at this season's eventual champions and think that they didn't win a proper competition (watch it be us now). Better to put yourself in a good position for 2021.

Yeah i was thinking this aswell, if we did finally win it this year opposition fans would throw that around saying it doesn't count as a proper win etc

Why. From what I understand. We are most likely going to lose the loop fixtures. So 22 games. Plus the playoffs. Finnish come november or december. Jobs a gudden. However you put it. The winners this year will be rightful champions and earnt it.

The rumour is he was going to refuse to play because of concerns over Covid 19 anyway, so the club had little option. Sounds like a typical case of a relatively young player being swayed by a move and his agent giving him really bad advice in terms of maintaining a relationship with your club, but good advice if you are a selfish and cynical person.

The suggestion is that there will be no attempt to replace him this season, to cut costs and there may be another couple leaving early in a similar way. Seems like they're almost writing this season off if they do that.

Which makes me wonder about the current situation and Warrington. How would you feel if the inevitable end of the title drought was this season and in front of no crowd or a very small crowd in a makeshift Grand Final somewhere? Would that ruin the moment or would you not care?

I wouldn’t care, I am a firm believer once we get the 1st out of the way a few will follow in the space of 5/6 years anyway. We just need to get over the line and get the first one crowd or no crowd.

Couldn’t Kare less, how and whenever we win the grand final.Oppistion fans will be on here telling us how we never really won it anyway.

The Roosters are giving the Doggies a torrid time this morning. Thompson must be thinking WTF am I getting in to here. He maybe back before the end of the season!

[code][/code]
Thought you lot were announcing a marque signing...

We've signed Joel Thompson from Manly, presumably to replace Zeb Taia and are meant to be close to a couple more forwards. I don't think it'll be a marquee signing, but hopefully someone who's not far off replacing Luke Thompson.

There could still be absolute chaos in Super League. The likes of Wakefield and Cas can't be finding the current situation easy to cope with and it could be that there are some very good players available for next season later in the year if clubs decide to recover some cash.

Neither of those 2 should be in the league anyway, so I don't have much sympathy for their financial plight.

I agree. I can see a lot of movement between clubs and there may need to be some rules on how the cap works. So if I understand this correctly then Alex Thompson will still count on the cap for the whole of this season. But say for example wakefield are trying to reduce costs by offloading somebody like fafita then under the cap saints would not be able to sign him. Is that correct

You mean Luke Thompson?

He is no longer a Saints player, so that salary cap will be available for them to use this season - they are free to use it on whoever they want, as long as they dont go over the £2.1m cap limit plus exemptions.

Sign of the times ahead as teams release long players from contracts showing up now.

Stepping stone to us in a season or two

Sorry, yep, Luke Thompson. I guess the clue was in the thread title. So if we released BMM his remaining salary is free for us to use on a new signing as long as they balance out so that we don't go over the cap.