Super League and the NRL are set to take a step closer to negotiating a deal with one huge financial burden possibly set to be removed for club owners.
Per reports down under, NRL CEO Andrew Abdo is set to fly out to England to try and negotiate a deal which would see the NRL invest in Super League.
As yet, no official monetary offer has been laid out with a number of commentators in the UK believing that the talk made by NRL supremo Peter V’landys, including the imposition of a deadline, is simply an act of trying to pressure Super League clubs to yield control.
Whilst that could well be true, reports from the Sydney Morning Herald indicate that Abdo will now head to the UK and set out details of a proposed takeover with one very appealing aspect being that the NRL would cover all Super League salaries.
Currently, Super League clubs have a salary cap of £2.1 million but clubs do not receive that amount in central funding from the RFL with owners having to top that salary cap up, something that would change if the NRL became involved.
What NRL chiefs have previously said on Super League deal
Of course, the NRL would most likely want administrative control, as previously stated by Peter V’landys who has discouraged Super League club owners from letting ‘self-interest’ rule their heads.
Speaking in February, V’landys said: “If we put the investment in, then we need to control it independently. They’ll certainly be consulted but the model will never work if it’s a self-interest model and some of those clubs will have to relinquish control.
“It’s like shareholders in a company. If you’re a shareholder, you don’t operate the company – you trust a board of directors to run a company, to maximise the revenues and then maximise the dividends back to you.”
It now seems that one form of investment would be the NRL covering the salary cap thus relieving a major financial burden from club owners, with V’landys even stating back in February that he would help those owners earn money.
Asked for his message to owners reluctant to ceded control, V’landys said: “What I’d say to them is that I can stop you putting money in, I can make your investment a lot better but you’re going to have to give up control because it’s not working.”
With Andrew Abdo now reportedly set to travel to the UK, talks can be expedited with actual figures put on the table as opposed to theoretical scenarios.
