Australian publication questions money previously spent on Super League star and two former Super League targets

When compared to Super League, the NRL is filthy rich and that is evident with some of the fees players are paid in the modern game.

NRL clubs spend literal million on one or two players a year with contract offers valued over $4 million recently offered whilst an offer of $1.3 million per year has reportedly been tabled for Parramatta Eels star Mitchell Moses.

So, in light of this mega spending, the Daily Telegraph have assessed 15 of the biggest contracts in the NRL’s history to determine if they were boom or bust and have questioned the $4 million the Newcastle Knights paid Mitchell Pearce during his four year spell.

Pearce left the Knights at the end of 2021 to make the move to Super League with the Catalans Dragons leaving the Knights without a halfback a problem they have only just solved with the signing of former Wigan Warriors and Salford Red Devils star Jackson Hastings.

The publication conceded that he was the club’s best player for the four year spell but stated it got them no where: “Consistently the Knights’ best player during his time at the club. But you look back now and think, well, where did it get them? The fact is the Knights are almost back to square one after a decade of supposedly rebuilding.”

Meanwhile, the publication also questioned the money paid for former Super League targets Anthony Milford and Ash Taylor, especially Taylor suggesting that the money he was paid not only stifled his career but all but ended it.