To stay at 1.65M Quote:Super League clubs have agreed to maintain the salary cap at £1.65 million for the 2010 season following a meeting of club officials this week. Under the current cap, which is reviewed on an annual basis, clubs cannot spend more than £1.65 million before prize money payments on its top 25 earners whilst an extra £50,000 can be spent on players outside the top 25 who have made at least one first grade appearance during the season. In addition, club can continue to spend what they wish on juniors outside of the first team in 2010. Any player who has played for the same club for at least 10 consecutive seasons will also continue to have half their salary excluded from the cap for his eleventh and subsequent seasons subject to a maximum spend of £50,000 per club. More info here Good or Bad?

To stay at 1.65M Quote:Super League clubs have agreed to maintain the salary cap at £1.65 million for the 2010 season following a meeting of club officials this week. Under the current cap, which is reviewed on an annual basis, clubs cannot spend more than £1.65 million before prize money payments on its top 25 earners whilst an extra £50,000 can be spent on players outside the top 25 who have made at least one first grade appearance during the season. In addition, club can continue to spend what they wish on juniors outside of the first team in 2010. Any player who has played for the same club for at least 10 consecutive seasons will also continue to have half their salary excluded from the cap for his eleventh and subsequent seasons subject to a maximum spend of £50,000 per club. More info here Good or Bad?

Good for me, helps to even out the teams and make the SL more competitive/generate interest for all clubs.

I think it is a good thing for now but needs to start rising in the next couple of years.

I also think that clubs in respect of franchising should be forced to spend close to full cap to justify their continuing involvement in the competition to guarantee their competitiveness and contribution to the competition in the long run. maybe this could be done as a requirement for the round of franchising after the next.

But competitiveness is part of the franchising assessment (top 8 finishes IIRC) so why force clubs to spend money that may not be necessary? AFAIK the Giants don't spend close to full cap.

Key problem here is that salary cap excludes prize payments. So those clubs at the top regularly earn additional payments for high placed SL finish, get revenue for play offs/grand final apperances, WCC games, cup finals etc...

This means they can attract top quality players and pay them more than other SL clubs could ever afford. Although the gap across SL is closing - this has to be deemed even more remarkable due to the inequality that the lower clubs have to overcome.

Just think - if Giants finished say 4th in SL, won the CC final, got to the Grand Final (win or lose) just how much extra revenue that would bring to the club for youth development - and to help attract the better players to us.

So if you ever wondered how Saints can survive on average crowds playing out of a poor stadium and still rmain succesful - your answer lies in the above.

In a fans night mid way through last season Davy said we were spending close to full cap and I can't see that changing into this season.

Could explain why we let Hemingway, Lopag, Walsh and Crowther all go out on loan recently.