There's a strong rumour that Pritchard will be on his way to the NRL in 2017. I posted on the Hull board earlier the possibility that the exchange rate is playing a factor in him wanting to return. When the Pritchard signing was announced in June 2015, the £ to Aus$ exchange rate was £1:$2.04.

It's now around £1:$1.60, so a 20% relative drop.

This is creating an even greater gulf between the two leagues, and [iif[/i the current value of the £ relative to the Aus$ stays at similar levels for a long period of time, SL will struggle to keep it's talent and attract decent players from Aus/NZ (more so than it does already).

What's the solution, if there is one? Or do we ride it out and hope in time the value of the £ will improve?

It's not just the exchange rate, there is more money in the game over there, a higher salary cap and a higher profile for personal sponsorships. For the several years we've only been able to attract players who were considered fringe or past their prime by NRL clubs, and we've had to pay over the odds too. Benji Marshall has signed for Brisbane on a 1 year $100k deal, he could probably have got two or three times that as a marquee player for a SL club, but would lose his personal sponsorships. I'd actually like to see more UK players head to the NRL to gain experience, even if they cannot cut it they should benefit from the higher standards they'll be exposed to. At the same time it will make more space for young UK players, as the economics will make the UK increasingly unattractive to the Kolpak stiffs that many clubs have previously chased over youth development. The positive from this can be more homegrown players getting through to SL and more of the better SL players stepping up to the NRL which will strengthen the England team and import better standards.

The NRL salary cap is also increasing every year while the super league cap stays at the same level for an infinite amount of time.

No doubt more England players will be heading over to the NRL in the next few years.

Think Benji not wanting to be away from his family for a year was the more important factor in why he never came over.

Also the change to offshore taxes made a massive impact (IIRC the likes of Buderus were able to be paid at very low rates of tax until this was clamped down on).

The exchange rate and the NRL salary Cap have been having an impact more and more for years now, the Aussie dollar has been doing well for 10 years now against the pound and it shows in the amount of Aussie players over here going right down.

it's a good thing, the less reliant on imports the better.

Well that is not always good, great imports bring great quality and ideas and tactics and techniques.

There is definately a good mix to be had but sadly we cannot control exchange rates so sometimes we will have too many imports sometimes not enough.

If only we had enough quality home grown players to fill the gap.

If we want the salary cap to rise clubs need to increase their revenue. Otherwise we're just sacrificing other areas of clubs such as marketing and youth production.

Just being devil's advocate here but, is there anything within the cap rules about which currency a player should be paid in.
For example if the agreed to come over for x number of $Aus and that was based on the exchange rate of the day, it would be crazt to suddenly lose (or gain) cap space due to a sudden shift in the exchange rate.
Also, how does this affect Catalan Dragons.
The Euro is very strong against the pound at the moment and if they are permitted to spend a certain amount of Euros on s/c that amount has, in relative terms, increased recently.
However, over the past 4/5 years, pre the referendum the value of the Euro had been on the slide.

You would expect that there is something in the S/C detail about this but, there probably isn't, which potentially leaves things open to abuse.

It won't matter what exchange rate they are paid in as long as the out is in £s on the salary cap audit trail, rememeber it is live and set against what the RFL think a player is worth, so getting around it is unlikely on a large scale these days.

Does this mean that all clubs have to pay their players in Sterling ?
If not, there has to be some leeway within the system to allow for fluctuations in currency.
The salary cap is likely to be set in Sterling, therefore if Catalan pay their players in Euros (the local currency), it would be unreasonable for them to do a new calculation each month based on "today's" exchange rate.

The rate in November 2014 was around 1.27 euro's/pound and today its around 1.11.
Therefore if a player is paid 2000 euros per month it's gone from being worth £1574 in 2013 to £1801 now, which isn't really a problem if they are living in France but how does this work on the cap ?
If you have 25/30 players all suddenly earning around 15% more (in sterling) then is would likely burst the S/C ??

Exchange rates are set on Jan 1st each year for cap purposes. But given that cap value is a notional value rather than being linked to what a player actually receives, that's good enough. The contracts can be set out to pay players in A$ or € or anything else, but it is converted back to £ at the start of each year for calculating the cap value.

Paying in anything other than £ puts the uncertainty on the club rather than the player, and with the cap that's dangerous. If a club agreed a 2 year deal last year at A$650k the player would of counted for around £300k on the cap (very roughly I can't be bothered doing calculations!) but for this year it would be in the £350-375k range which is a big cap jump they would have to cover in January.

There is nothing to stop clubs hedging their positions for paying overseas players (or any of their players) just like any other importer/ exporter but that would only protect them against in year fluctuations (a big win in years like this year where there are big movements, but it is fairly exceptional). What it wouldn't protect clubs against is an ever weakening £ for next year for example, where the £ remains weak but with no major movements.

A far better plan would be to start raising the cap. All currency fluctuations are doing is making our tiny cap even smaller.

Top post, thanks.
Correct on the Cap level.
It should always have increased with inflation (at the very least) and if clubs couldn't hit the cap, then tough.
The Marquee Player, has effectively lifted the cap by a fair chunk but, once again, the main stalling point is the underselling of the sport with Sky and the individual clubs relying too heavily on the Sky income and not doing enough to increase their own revenues.

The lack of an increased salary cap is a bit of a red herring - most clubs struggle to spend up to the current cap. The real issue is the lack of money in the game over here. If most of the clubs were rolling in massive profits year after year, then the cap would no doubt increase, but they're not, the majority are run on a shoe string and are only ever a couple of poor decisions away from oblivion.

There would be a few clubs who could and would spend more - but I don't think that would have an impact on the quality of the league. The NRL is so far ahead now, players in their prime do not want to come over to Super League as it's seen as such an inferior competition - so you'd still not get the better NRL players and certainly not in any great numbers. The only way we'd currently get a top NRL player is if there are issues forcing them away from the NRL, or if they were offered ridiculous money - and in reality, if they're just going to chase the money, there will be higher bidders in Rugby Union, so they'd go there.

The game is fast becoming more and more of a mess over here. There needs to be a 'whole of game' review, from drains up. The pathways and lack of a decent reserve grade mean if kids haven't made it by 19, there's minimal chance they'll come through, the game is losing its traditional fans by moving away from the combatitive nature that has always attracted them and our national exposure is at an all time low. Rugby League is losing its identity in this country.

Non-rugby league folk I work with can all name players from the 80's and 90's - your Schofields, Hanleys, Edwards.... But the only ones any of them have heard of nowadays are Burgess (because of his time in union) and Sinfield (because of his sports personality appearance). I think the loss of the 'Great Britain' team has had a massive impact on that.

I'm a die-hard rugby league man - brought up on the game and still play in the NCL and am heavily involved in amateur rugby - which is also in a complete mess with the whole summer/winter shambles. But even I am losing patience with the game - I watched less Super League this year than ever, the standards awful in comparison to years gone by (and the NRL) and the sanitised version of the game simply doesn't have the appeal of yesteryear.

BIG changes are needed - because there are plenty of folk who are feeling not too dis-similar to me.

The marquee player rule will soon run into the problem of MAD. The Williams to Warrington rumours, regardless of how true, demonstrate it perfectly. With Tomkins tied up long term, and not looking great value, any club with the marquee space free can be whispering in Williams ear about how he would be their marquee. Soon enough the conclusion will be to avoid filling the space at all costs, just in case another club comes sniffing at any of their other players. If Williams had of joined Warrington as a marquee, I would of expected someone else to be in Hills ear. If all clubs had jumped on it, and there were very few clubs with space that could of been avoided, but caution meant there are too many clubs with free space and it puts the clubs that have used the rule at a disadvantage in the recruitment market.



If I recall correctly 11 clubs spent up to the cap last year?

I agree absolutely that there are bigger issues than just raising the cap, but the decision to peg the cap with inflation would be a massive symbolic step in terms of accepting it needs to grow. Clubs are still suffering from overspend of the early 90s and clubs are only just on their way to resolving those issues, so we always had to accept a period of limited growth, but the problem isnt that we limited growth, its that we stagnated.

If the game in this country didn't employ so many Oceanics, who take money out of the game, then this wouldn't be an issue

Top players will not move to England, why would they unless they get double what they get in the NRL.
It would be like Ronaldo moving to the Australian Hyundai A League.
The English game has not attracted top shelf Australians for two decades without paying massive overs for them.
Only a couple come to mind, Buderus and King.
Others have moved because they had been blackballed in the NRL like Carney and have come for a well paid Holiday.

You might have to explain that one ??

Surely every player who earns a living from RL is entitled to spend their earnings as they choose.
It doesn't matter if they are from Batley or Brisbane, Cronulla or Castleford ??

And we obviously dont. Like I said on another thread, if our juniors cant displace the second rate aussies that come over compared to what we used to get its a problem with either quality of kids coming through or problems deep at the start stemming from junior coaching at amateur clubs. I presume its the latter as well as the RFL making kids have to have made it by 19 with their money saving measures

where the hell are you going with this. Please explain how oceanic take money out of the game.

He's an idiot who thinks every club should have players from amateur clubs in their area only

You REALLY cannot work that out!!!!!

No, neither can anyone else.