It's easy to offer opinions after the event. Burgess is moving on, no compensation for the club, in hindsight someone messed up.

Great Gildart signed to long term deal, I watched him against Aussie juniors he looked promising, he played against Leigh and looked light weight a work in progress. He is now on a long term deal what if he turns out like Crooks or Arundel all promise and then goes off track?
Does the club still get the blame? When the tolerant fans make him the latest "scapegoat" will there be posts about who signed him to long term deal?

First of all I'm a BIG Joe Burgess fan and didn't (don't) want him to go. I would have advised him to stay at Wigan for three years and then move if he wanted, but would the offer still be there (a bird in the hand etc)

However let's look at the hard facts.

Burgess was still only 19 years of age when all this began and had two years of his contract still to run. Negotiations were ongoing from early last season when he hadn't yet established himself as a first team player. He had a fantastic season and negotiations continued.

Should Wigan have matched or got close to his Aussie offer? If I had been Lenagan / Radlinski I would have offered a lower initial contract with year by year increases over a four year period but with caveats (tries scored, games played, England games etc) They may have done this, I don't know.

What would fans be saying if he had signed a long term deal and then suffered a Kevin Penny, Shaun Ainscough Gary Wheeler, Jamie Foster type drop in form.

There is no easy solution especially as Wigan do have a wage structure that they work to. If they broke that for Burgess would the likes of Gildart, Williams, Hampshire, Sutton want similar deals. I honestly don't think there's an easy answer or one that's right or wrong.

Good luck to him I really do wish him well and am sorry he's going but it opens the door for someone else. I remember speaking to him at the end of season dinner in 2013 when he said "I want Pat Richards shirt next season"
Now go and do yourself and your family proud in Aus.

Are we really saying that a Wigan first-teamer, however young, could only be on £160 pw? That sounds incredible to me.

And, needless to say, if true, wrong, wrong, wrong!

Well if you want players to leave, that is the way to do it.

One of my first memories of a player signing for Wigan was a very young Shaun Edwards. It was all over the media back that at 17 he signed for a signing on fee of £35,000. That would be £108,000 today!

That is because Wigan recognised the schoolboy internationals talent and wanted to tie him to Wigan despite the interests of several other clubs and that is what they did. The rest is history.

Some players are special talents and warrant that kind of up front investment or higher wages. Otherwise they leave/don't sign as others are prepared to take what maybe a risk but they do stump up the cash.

If as was suggested above Burgess offered to stay for less than offered in OZ and if Wigan would not budge not because it was an unrealistic amount of money to pay to a player but just that it was more than other players of his age and experience or due to some self imposed club wage structure, then we will never sign another Shaun Edwards again if that is the attitude.

Not all players are equal and some are worth more than others and it looks like Burgess has realised his worth by going elsewhere.

Agreed, with Manfredi in reserve it would be daft to offer Burgess a massive contract, particularly as wing isn't exactly a key role either. Didn't IL say a massive problem with the previous regime was that a few players took up a huge amount of cap space? Can't blame him if this is partly a case of picking his battles so to speak

What a stupid comparison.
There was no salary cap at that time, I'm not even sure if there was freedom of contract in Rugby League.

Do you remember Daryl Lacey?

times change, salary cap and no sugar daddy

If Kris is in charge of contracts then he has a difficult job in negotiations with the agents of Charnley, Hampshire, Sarginson and Gelling. The latter two should be the easiest although I thought Gelling had signed a new two year deal not long ago.
As for Josh and Rocky then that's going to be challenging. Both are top players in their scope.
Josh is a top try scorer and Ryan one of the best of his age in the League.
To find a way through, do we have a "marquee player" catagory in the club's own pay structure?
I'd imagine Lockers would be very well paid, or should be. Bowen will be on a very tidy sum too.
Does this catagory go further down the pecking order?
There should be SC space and this was admitted ealier when Eddie suddenly departed. Surely therefore there is space in the club's own pay structure for an "adjustment" to accomodate our most talented lads.
All four players mentioned need to be retained but I'd imagine Josh and Ryan will be, or should be, the priority

Daryl is a good friend of mine and he had a lot of personal issues. He didn't get anywhere near to fulfilling his potential but there was mitigating circumstances.

But I do agree, with the salary cap in place (And so low IMO) it is hard to tie down the youngsters early

It is not a stupid comparison at all and certainly not as daft as your initial idea.

Where did I say break the salary cap? If an exceptional young player comes along and you pass because he is worth £90K a year (as determined by the market) and you won't pay it then you lose the young player. Not just any player but one of exceptional talent.

It is about ambition and more importantly recognition of talent and what you have to pay to secure it.



He was, if I recall correctly a young lad signed at about 12 years old who has since obviously vanished. What has that got to do with it? Edwards in 1983 wasn't 12 and neither is Burgess Burgess in 2015. The talent of these two was/is there to see already and is about paying the going rate for it or not.

What will you say if Hampshire follows Burgess? I see no reason to expect to hang onto him if the club won't match his value when it is within its power to do so.

One problem with the market dictating his value is that Wigan can't follow the market because of the salary cap.

The other problem with the market dictating his worth is that it fluctuates. Anyone lucky enough to witness Ryan's displays at Leigh and Saints recently will have wondered what all the fuss is about (and before anyone mentions he did well at Stand Off against Leigh - that was a Championship team not at full strength).

Personally I'd have rather Wigan spent some money buying a Super League standard Half Back for the coming season.

In sport those planning for the future forget the present. The future never comes. At the moment Hampshire (and Williams) isn't good enough to play regularly in a TOP Super League team. Whether he will is a matter of crystal ball gazing.

If someone wants to offer him silly money, let them. Same with Burgess. They may consider this though, the grass isn't always greener elsewhere. Burgess will be back from Australia with his tail between his legs because he isn't good enough to get in the Roosters team in my view. Hampshire will do well to sign the contract offered by Wigan because from what I've seen he is seriously overrated (which doesn't mean he isn't good - just that he isn't as good as people think)

he was only the same as Ryan King, its just that Burgess took off. Same could have happened to Burgessa s happened to KIng. Its ok saying they should have known but its a risk.

If you look at our team from 2010 to now, all I can see is experience / big earners being lost and inexperience taking over from academy on what would I would think less money.

There is a post on the St Helens forum about Wigan and January sales! I know we won trophies in that time but if we are spending more or less the full cap there are some players who are well over paid! We seem to be turning into Arsenal who are recruiting low end or players we think are projects we can improve. If we was getting are own stadium like they did I like most probably wouldnt mind but it doesnt look like we are.

What doesnt bear thinking about is our entire back line almost could change at the end of the year. We face the prospect of losing our full back, rumoured to be going back to aus at the end of the season, burgess confirmed as going, Charnley rumoured to be not happy at the terms offered, sarginson rumoured to be off to the NRL and gelling who is also off contract. That doesnt bear thinking about.

Half of the 2010 team aren't playing anymore so we couldn't do much about losing them. There are a couple of players in there I'd love to still see with us (Tomkins and Hansen) but it's not to be.

The squad has lost high earner over the years but we carry a big squad with plenty of depth and that costs money. We have a squad full of developing players as you point out, but in having that you know their salaries will need to go up as they make those improvements. The club seems to leave money in the pot to cover that. If you look at the situation of Dan Sarginson, we signed him as a 'project' from Quins and he's improved out of sight. The club are in talks with him to extend his deal now and I presume the guy will be asking for a hefty pay increase (and rightfully so). That has to come from somewhere!

Lenagan and Wane have admitted there's some money in the pot still if a new signing becomes available so we're in pretty good shape all things considered.