: Sun Jul 12, 2009 6:10 pm
Bully_Boxer wrote:
Perhaps a few years ago. A lot more than 4 SL clubs are spending the full cap nowadays. I feel we could have expected to make the play offs as a minimum with the players we have.
To add to that, in an attempt to address some of the naivity the salary cap question inspires, here is an extract from something I posted elsewhere:
"...Add in too the caution not to assume that the salary cap represents the total of what the players at a club receive, or is directly comparable between clubs. It depends also very much on things like the proportion of a player's package (especially overseas ones) which a club thinks it can justify in paying in non-PAYEable form, and the ability of a player (cos it can't be the club...) to secure payment for his image rights from an "unconnected" third party. And that assumes every club has been making complete and accurate salary cap declarations, of course. Some of these matters are subject to current investigation by HMRC and the RFL, and while certain clubs are seemingly pretty worried, I have it on strong authority that Bulls are not amongst them. Maybe that has some bearing on comparing squads between clubs? - whatever."
That was part of a wider post commenting on a thread started by the Gledster on the club's seeming decline. Remember my point from before, that you can secure a better-quality squad if you can find ways to pay players more of their total package tax free (or if they can secure image rights etc earnings from outside the club). But I did go on to conclude:
"That said, its still hard to see how any of the above explains the repeated capitulations in defence we have seen time after time this year. You just sit and wait for it to happen - and that against Cas was totally and utterly unacceptable and I for one have totally lost patience with it now."
I can't comment on today - I did not go - but from what has been written, its sounds like I'd have no reason to say anything any different.
