Championship players are consistently turning down Super League offers, says ex-player

Dom Speakman has explained how he’s seen many Championship players refuse Super League contracts on the basis that ‘the money doesn’t make sense’.

Speakman, who announced his retirement from rugby league in September at just 28, was chatting to the ‘Trot The Egg In’ podcast about second tier players turning down top-flight offers.

He said: “Yeah, so I played with Liam Harrison up at Barrow and he was obviously an awesome player and his brother Ben was playing at Warrington at the time, he got numerous offers to go and sign for Warrington and other Super League clubs.

“But ultimately he was a quantity surveyor and he was earning a good wage at Barrow. The money that Warrington and the other clubs could offer him wasn’t even matching, say half of that, you just think ‘I’m not going to take this off my family’s table for that’ when he’s secure.

“They’d say ‘right we want you to sign a one-year deal and if you do well we’ll give you a better one’. Well it’s not a lot of security is it?”

Meanwhile, Speakman is now set to expand his gym business ‘Transfit’ with his partner, Lauren, as he aims to build a life outside the game of rugby league after hanging up his boots much earlier than expected.

“The main reason why I haven’t got time to be playing rugby at the moment is down to the fact we’re expanding in the gym. So our unit at the moment is 2,000 square foot and we’ve just taken on a unit that’s 18,000 square foot, so a bit of a jump.

“I just didn’t think it would be the right time in my life to be spending three nights a week at training and playing on a Sunday, when I could be putting my effort into something that’s probably going to last me 40 years hopefully, instead of the next four.”