We're all being facetious regards Johns but the truth is Wire could have sold out their current capacity and probably more if someone of Johns calibre came over again, imagine Wire announcing Thurston tomorrow, even away fans would want to see him and it would be a big deal in RL circles here and abroad.

But we did get them before when the financials worked in our favour, we got some quality players coming over here. People like King, Lauitiiti, Lyon, Barret, Bai, Johns, Jones.

Maybe we wouldnt get an Inglis right now, no reason we couldnt get a Shaun Johnson. Are we going to get a Billy Slater? probably not, A Brett Stewart? probably. We probably wont get Cronk, we certainly could have brought Widdop back, We could have kept Soward, no reason we couldnt have swooped in for Jennings.

Will it make it more likely that occasionally circumstances will conspire so that we get a real top level player? A Thurston, a Smith, An Inglis? Of course.

So we can only get 2nd tier Ozzie players (still class for SL)? hardly Marquee though are they?
Luke Walsh is about the top class we will get. Quality player no doubt, but not what i would class as marquee

Like Walsh as top class currently, you could get better if you had a money no object option open up to you.
Even if they're just off the prime, Slater is past his best but still a phenomenal player.

but we wont get them because the small un-ambitious clubs outnumber the large successful ones.....at the moment......

Saints and Hull voted against, big clubs there for you.

i think we would be able to get better players than Walsh. I think Soward is a much better player than Walsh and would easily be top 2 or 3 halves in the country if had stayed over here.

If we are bringing in players who will be among the top 2 or 3 in their position over here, then im ok with that. I would say they are a marquee player.

a marquee exemption would allow us to bring in 2nd tier aussies, top tier Kiwis, top tier islanders, and on occasion when it circumstances conspired some top tier aussies.

I dont think that struggling to get the very very best Aussies means we shouldnt A) try to bring them, or B) bring in better players.,

Crowd-wise I think there'd be a fairly positive novelty factor, were the top teams able to attract a genuine superstar each. But to do that they'd have to ignore the claims of those already on the payroll. For example, Leeds might lure Thurston but in the process lose Kallum Watkins. It's not too much of a stretch to believe that Thurston would increase the gate whereas Watkins wouldn't as he's already there and has been for some seasons. And were Watkins to move to union, the English game would be worse off, not better. Of course this is hypothetical and Leeds might at some stage lose Watkins in any case. But I reckon the ramifications of a marquee exemption are a lot less predictable than many seem to think.

im not sure how or why Leeds getting Thurston could lead to Leeds losing Watkins?

Have a salary cap that reflects the club's individually. Have it as a percentage of income rather than a unilateral fixed amount.
Then the likes of Wigan, Hull FC and Leeds would be able to spend more, then the more successful you are at raising money the more you're able to spend but at the same time you can't spend wildly and bankrupt yourselves. Coupled with a marquee allowance the game could attract more money.

No way can the game over here afford the top NRL players,you would need to pay them so much more than they are currently earning to compensate them for losing out on SOO and International caps and loss of sponsors etc.

If/when the marquee rule comes in we should get stuck into the English & Welsh union players after they've had there world cup

You don't think a player of Watkins' talent might feel somewhat devalued if Thurston - or any other player - was earning double his salary?

I was being sarcastic and proving a point that by allowing marquee signings to happen, attendances and interest in RL in general would increase. As someone else said, I believe Warrington would sell out their current capacity if they were able to bring over a similar stature of player today.



We wont know until Super League clubs are given the chance to match what they are being pai/offered in the NRL or RU, but I dont see a reason why not.

The current players of that quality are Smith. Thurston, Inglis and SBW.



I know from a discussion with Marwan Koukash that he would have offered that for SBW. I have no doubts Warrington and Wigan would too, given the additional revenue clubs would generate from such a superstar player.



It will only take one or two to make the step, before you know the relatively low profile Super League becomes much more appealing. I have no doubt that the major players in the NRL would struggle with lucrative endorsements deals over here, especially if Paul Sculthorpe can cream what he did from Gilette.



Correct, it doesnt help when clubs like St Helens appear to be satisfied with the big fish in a small pond syndrome too.

Thurston already earns more than him.

it also assumes that someone else is willing to offer a Thurstonesq salary to him. Which would leave us in the exact same position as now if someone where to offer those wages now.

If you can't 'spend wildly', then success likely becomes self perpetuating, locking it in (and out). The big clubs whine on about artificial constraints, but that is trying to have it both ways. It'd be better and fairer to get shot altogether IMO. And if clubs go bust, that's their lookout.

The problem the cap faces is that people expect it to do too many things. It's to retain competitive balance and to protect clubs from themselves an to incentivise player development, and now it has to provide flexibility for us to compete with much wealthier competitors.

We can't legislate our problems away. Increasingly I feel that we'd be better taking a Darwinian, laissez faire approach. We'd have to accept that 'adapt or die' would likely see some 'deaths', but it is ridiculous trying to hold so many competing and disparate agendas together. Hopefully what doesn't 'kill' the survivors would make them stronger. So bin all the caps and quotas, with their exemptions and exceptions and distortions. It's clearly all about self-interest, so let's have freedom and self-reliance to go with it.

That's extraordinarily right of the economic centre for me, but the excess of complexity and lack of transparency has started to do my nut in.

Here's Widnes's take on marquee signings: www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/sport/ru ... er-6751587

Here's Widnes's take on marquee signings: www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/sport/ru ... er-6751587

Why not link the ‘golden ticket’ to clubs doing what we want them to do?

Have 12 academy products make more than 15+ appearances get a golden ticket for next year, have 17, get 2.
Make a profit, get a golden ticket,
Get attendances over 15k average get a golden ticket, get averages over 20k get 2, increase your attendances by more than 30% get one that kind of thing.

I also think it would be worthwhile to have the RFL contribute £100k to each marquee signing so that if the smaller clubs can achieve some of the things needed, they can indulge in that reward.

I thought you were against entrenching the status quo



Also, what if saints met the criteria for the 12 academy players in year 1 - signed a "marquee" on a 5 year contract using the golden ticket we gained then sacked the 12 youngsters to pay for said marquee? We wouldn't meet the criteria in year 2 so do we lose the golden ticket? How are we expected to break the 5 year contract?

The problem with year on year performance is that these "marquee" signings contracts aren't for just a year. Also at best a club should only have 1, most clubs finances can't afford a hit of 500k+ !

A system where by the rfl held the contracts and were loaned for a year in a draft system could work - and each club gets a set of targets and whoever achieves most gets first pick etc could work, but then, who at the rfl would pick who to sign? The England coach? I wouldn't want mcbanana handing out multiple hundred I contracts! And I don't know where the money for it would come from, as your probably looking £2m+ for 12 "marquees" and I'm not sure which kind of player would sign up to be at another club every year. But other than that it could work

Would payments to players for the cross-code game count against the cap? Or is that a little way Sir Marwan is getting around it.

tickets would simply last the length of the players initial contract.

im also not sure that it would entrench the status quo, no reason that a smaller club cant field academy products, or increase crowds by 30%

also just because a club has a golden ticket, it doesnt mean they need to spend £500k.

It's all well and good saying Andrew John's sold out Warrington for 3 games.

However, we are not talking about a couple of games. We are talking signing on for a year or more. As a Saints speccy I would pop down to Warrington and watch Johns for an odd game. But I'm not going to turn up week in week out. I'd just turn up at the away fixture.

Also when you talk about Andrew John's making headlines, where exactly????

My point about Birmingham is that fine crowds at Warrington grow, but it does not break into anywhere else. It sells the local rag in Warrington, but would hardly be a blip on the landscape.

I've worked up in Preston only 20 minute from St Helens, less than that from Wigan. In the middle of Lancashire. Walk into a school and ask who is Cooper Cronk. I'd be surprised if you got one child who knew.

I have no problem there would be an upsurge in crowds in the current localities. But it would not solve the RL problems in the UK.
I would also argue that the growth in crowds would not match the outlay.
The Good DR was talking £1million for SBW's. Well as soon as the rule comes in suddenly he's gonna have to pay a lot more, as Wigan and Leeds and Saints would have to start moving with their big money people.

You may as well remove the cap and let clubs pay what they want. Then you will see a sudden turn around when those who have caught up due to others being restrianed suddenly find, oh they have buckets full of money and we can never match them.

Of course in the long run we would end up with clubs who have just managed to turn a profit. Losing it all on long shots. I'm not bothered from my own clubs perspective, I'm sure we would bankrupt ourselves as good as any other team chasing the dream of x player will win us stuff. Only to find that years later the money never came in like we thought and we are going to have to sell our ground to survive.

I'm not surprised others hold a different point of view as it's a very English disease to spend what we don't have and sod tomorrow. Bet it all on black and let the wheel spin.

I suspect it's very easy to get around the cap if you really want to, either via a loophole or by actually breaking the rules but in such a way that the chances of being caught are virtually nil.
Didn't Koukash once say he knew clubs were paying players wives to get around it? And that he would do the same. I don't recall anyone in officialdom pulling him up over it.

There's nothing wrong with paying players wives, it still counts on the cap for that player. But it can potentially be better for both player and club re income tax.

no one has ever suggested, even a little that a marquee allowance would solve all the problems the game faces. No one has suggested even a little that it would be some sort of panacea for the games ills.

It would solve one problem, thats it. Thats all it would do, and all it was intended to do.

What you seem to want to ignore is the inherent risks in your 'jam tomorrow' standpoint

I wonder if anyone's ever thought of paying a player extra via their wife/girlfriend/brother-in-law/mate and not telling the RFL about it? Maybe even through a different company?