There should certainly be reward for bringing through your own players, with further 'discounts' if they become internationals.

Rugby League Week's "The Mole" reckons Leeds have zero chance of landing Widdop.

Who decides whether a player is "marquee" and does it have to be a signing or could it be a new contract for a current player.

For example, could Leeds us the "marquee" loophole to stop someone like Watkins, for example, being poached by the NRL or union?

Frankly, I am against it but I know I am in the minority who doesn't crave big name signings each season.

You contradict yourself in your own post.

Your quite correct on marquee, and I think the proposal is to nominate a player outside of the cap, based on the salary paid. So new or current.

Surely anyone would crave the Marquee each year, if meant keeping of losing a player?

Why? Where do I say That I would like Leeds to use this to keep a player? I asked a question.

I'd certainly rather not lose a player like Watkins but nor do I think making him a "marquee" player would be good for the team. In fact, it would go against everything the team has been built upon over the last decade. So, no, I wouldn't crave it even if it meant losing a talented young player.

We've lost players before to Union and NRL and we will lose them again. But the players that want to be here (like Watkins and Hall) are here for the right reasons and help build what we've built.

The marquee player rule is one for the rich owners like Moran, Lenegan and Koukash, who don't like and aren't used competing on a level playing field.

It's one for those chairmen who want to buy rather than build success.

Frankly, it's got nothing going for it other than making a small handful of players much richer and a handful of rich men more self-important than they already are.

That sums it up for me. Having a level playing field is great for the competition in this country in a way but it does mean that our best talent just likely to be drawn to the nrl or union.

The best the rfl can do is support the clubs who can't afford the salary cap, to try and stay more fansand generate more money in the game

I think it does create a possibility of dressing room dissension when one guy is picked for the marquee player role, especially if you have a few players who would be worthy of the spot.

I don't think it means one page has to be paid a vast amount more just that you can nominate a page to not count. You could have your four top players all earning the Dame because one of them is counted as the marquee player. That's how I would implement it anyway

level playing field means everyone spending at Wakefields level is that really what the salary cap should do?

I disagree. Level playing field is everyone having the opportunity to spend the same. The likes of Wakefield who do not seem to be able to make the best of their lot should not hold back the rest in the country. Id be interested to see which clubs doesn't what, and what they could spend. At they point at which more than 8 teams can afford to spend full cap it should be increased.

Should be used not only to keep the playing field level but to give clubs something to aim to, including the bigger clubs

Or radical action to more efficiently use and increase the available money in SL, a smaller number of teams, consolidation of poorer clubs to produce an entity with the financial resources to compete. New franchise(s) Cumbria? I don't necessarily promote any of the above as an answer. But I do have concerns that if SL doesn't find ways to move forward with a critical mass of viable competitive clubs, we risk a tail slide into oblivion.

Still at least we won today

I recall Alan Tait's autobiography mentioning the Leeds players disquiet in the dressing room before the 1995 Cup Final about who was and wasn't getting Super League Loyalty payments. That harmonious dressing room made for a great Leeds diplay that day.

I recall Alan Tait's autobiography mentioning the disquiet in the Leeds dressing room before the 1995 cup final about who was and wasn't getting a Super League loyalty contract. That "harmonious" dressing room produced a great display that day.

our players deserve to be richer. The finances of a club are the responsibility of the owners, not the players, they shouldnt accept less nor should they need to go to RU or Australia to earn their worth.

If a clubs owner cannot be trusted to negotiate a fair deal with David Howes or ShowmethemoneyUK then the SC isn't going to stop them running their club in to the ground.

If you want a game where there is a level playing field in terms of spending there are plenty of amateur sports worth your attention. If you want elite professional sport it should be pretty obvious someone got to pay for that. I don't see why a cabal of owners should be able to collude to make sure its their employees who pay for it.

Just how many SL players have gone to NRL or Union solely to "earn their worth"?

A handful. Which would suggest that the overwhelming majority regard themselves being pretty fairly remunerated for what they do.

Those who want marquee exemptions or rid of the cap are living in cloud cuckoo land if they think it will somehow improve the quality of the competition. It will simply result in a lot more mediocre players taking more money than they currently are out of the game, as it drives wages up across the board.

SL clubs still aren't going to be able to retain those who want to move to Australia to experience the lifestyle, or Union to experience the higher international profile. Neither will they be able to attract those from the NRL with ambitions to play Origin or internationals, who will stay there to enhance their selection chances.

Then wages wouldn't go up would they and it wouldn't be a problem would there.

If you think that bringing James Graham back, Sam, Tom and George Burgess back, Kyle Eastmond back wouldn't improve the quality of our competition I don't know what you are expecting from a quality competition.

If those type of players wont come, then it doesn't cost us anything.

If these mediocre players aren't worth more, then they wont be able to demand more will they. If they are easily replaceable by cheaper players, they will be easily replaced by cheaper players. If they aren't, and if their skills are in demand then they will be able to sell their skills at its value. That's how an employment market works.

from the viewpoint of the game as a business, there are two reasons why a business struggles, either:

It spends too much

or

Its not bringing enough in.

When the SC was brought in, Wigan were spending £3.2m on wages, the original SC was at £2.3m and brought down to £1.8m. Now 13 seasons later we are still at £1.8m. In real terms Wigans salaries are £3m (about 150% lower) pounds lower today than they were in 2002. The original Salary Cap is £1.6m lower in real terms than it was in 2002 (nearly 100% lower) and had the SC just kept up with inflation after being implemented we would currently have an SC of £2.6m. But we don't. We have one £800k less than that. Our players earn much less today than they did a decade ago. Yet attendances are up and apparently the new tv deal results in a near 70% increase in funding to clubs. There is a point at which we will have to admit that the problem isn't that we are spending too much, we quite obviously aren't. The problem is some aren't bringing enough in.

And its all very well us getting smug about how well GH is running our club, the profits he is making and the increases in revenue, but its not that hard to increase profits if you just pay employees less.

But Smokey, the point is that unless you sculpt out a marquee player allowance, Andy G is right - you'd just get across the board pay rises for exactly the same set of players we have now, with a marginally better class of Aussie thrown in. Even if you double the spend, that's the very first thing that would happen.

Wage inflation in sports is a reality - as income rises a lot of it is siphoned straight to existing players, for no discernible benefit to the sport as a whole. Name any pro sport and you see the same effect across the board. The NRL isn't going to see a seismic shift in the quality of players as a result of the cap going up. All that will happen is that the top players will earn more, as will everyone right down to those on a minimum wage.

I have no problem with wages rising sustainably. Allowing the cap as a whole to rise and admitting that the gap between top and bottom will increase is also not a huge problem so long as clubs are protected from themselves on some basis.

If its marquee players you want, then deal with them separately. I have no problem with Tomkins getting paid extra above Wigan's cap for example, so long as its clear its for him and him alone, and it would be up to Wigan to deal with any ego issues arising from that.

Wage inflation in sport is a reality just as inflation in general life is a reality. The top players should be earning more. The fact is that if a players wages go up its because their skills are in demand and their value is higher than we are currently paying.

The marquee player exemption is dancing around the fact that the salary cap isnt working and it will struggle to justify itself as something other than an unreasonable restraint of trade and exploitation of the players by the owners.

If it’s props you need there are a fair few currently plying their trades in the Champioship that could potentially step up like Chris Hill did. From what I’ve seen this year there is a lot of undeveloped talent, particularly in the forwards, that could make it in SL and possibly further. You could probably afford half a dozen for the price of one NRL player.

Can we at least agree that the gap should stay the same in real terms? That it should go up to reflect inflation, and maintain the value it was worth when it was introduced?

A higher cap will stop player drain. Both because for some (Tomkins J, Eastmond, Ashton) international honours were not so obviously imminent as they were for the likes of Burgess when they left. Second, because a better contract in SL will help clubs ward off the temptation that the NRL & RU can offer. Maybe not for the biggest stars like SBW or Burgess, but certainly for the likes of Joe Burgess, Hodgson & Tomkins - the high quality english players we need to be keeping in our competition.

The marquee player rule is also a good idea, and I don't think it'd create dressing room tension. I don't think anyone at Salford is going to object to SBW being the best-paid player, nor anyone at Leeds resenting Jonathan Thurston's wage packet.

Like whom?

From what you've seen at Baldwinson at Fev do you reckon he's to make the step up to SL?

I would suggest there are very few players in SL that are of interest to anyone outside of SL. Whether the players feel suitably remunerated is a mute point as most have no other means of matching the income they receive from the sport.

The idea that you can have real wage deflation and a quality increase in the competition doesn't make any sense. Most would agree the quality on the field has reached a worryingly poor standard. The idea of developing youngsters is a good one but the have to see a viable financial future if they are to make the commitment required to reach the required standard. It could be that many youngsters are turned off the sport at a young age because the earning potential is so low compared to Football, Rugby Union, Cricket etc.

We need to be able to attract better quality Aussies and players from RU if we are improve the competition on offer. Increasing the cap doesn't have to mean all players salaries go up but what it might mean is the really top players are correctly rewarded.

Perhaps a cap on the CEO salaries would be a good idea - guarantee if it had been linked to the players SC it would not be at the same level it has been for the past 10 years.

There's got to be another Darren Fleary out there waiting. The trick is finding the one who can make the step up. There are guys who have the ability to raise their performance to a higher level when they are put in that environment and it's hard to show that until you are put alongside better players.

The ones that have caused us problems have generally been older heads in their mid 20s. The Batley props stood out as did the whole pack at Leigh (mind you they were pumped up like crazy). Halifax have a decent pack but lack conditioning.

Baldwinson may come good but he's not there yet - he's got a bit to learn and loses a bit in comparison with more experienced props at that level as it's more physical than SL. He'll be one of those that requires patience and may well come good later. I think the current system where kids are potentially on the scrap heap at 19 is particularly bad for props since it's a position you need a bigger and stronger physique for that many 19 year olds will be lacking. I'd argue that a return to the "A" Team would be better for everyone - but then money is tight at some clubs.

Leeds could make an offer to some lads in their mid 20s to give full time a go for a year or 18 months. You may turn up another Fleary or a Chris Hill.