Negotiations involving ex-Hull KR man slammed as NRL stars nudged towards Super League switch

Negotiations about the future of the NRL salary cap are still on going as former hull KR star Clint Newton who is President of the Players Association negotiations with the likes of Peter V’Landys and Andrew Abdo over the future of the sport in Australia.

Now they have been slammed by journalist Phil Rothfield as they leave players in limbo.

“Nathan Brown is like a lot of players in the NRL – Marty Taupau is another one – that are waiting for the salary cap to be finalised and it’s causing enormous problems across the game,” Rothfield said on Big Sports Breakfast.

“A player like Matt Lodge at the Roosters has actually signed a contract with the Roosters but it cannot be registered because they’d go over the salary cap and it hasn’t been increased yet.

“The Wests Tigers are waiting for finalisation of the salary cap also before they can formulate their actual offer to Nathan Brown and what Nathan Brown does is going to have a knock on effect around the game because I think Marty Taupau will finish up at Parramatta once they have the cap space from Nathan Brown going, so it’s still really, really messy.

“It’s not right on a lot of these players, that they’re being held up by these CBA negotiations.”

Marty Taupau’s situation has reportedly let to interest from Super League clubs who are keen on exploiting the situation and bringing him over whilst the same could be said of winger Josh Mansour.

Meanwhile, Dean Ritchie also revealed on the radio show that Penrith are unable to make any further signings until they know the situation with the cap:

“I spoke to Matt Cameron the Panthers CEO yesterday and they’ve only got 26 players on their books, they’ve got four to go and they want to sign a couple but they cannot do a thing,” Richie said.

“He said ‘I cannot do anything until we know what this final figure is’ for the salary cap.

“So there is a lot of people out there locked in a holding pattern until this damn CBA gets done, it’s been going since February and I do fear it won’t be done until the new year.”