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The Gold Coast Titans have been docked four NRL competition points and fined $300,000 for breaching the salary cap.
$75,000 of the fine has been suspended by the NRL due to the club self-reporting the breaches and cooperating the with body’s investigation, but it is still another massive blow to a club that has recently had to leave its high-performance centre and remove coach John Cartwright.
There are four other clubs that have been hit with fines worth over $90,000, including the Manly Sea Eagles, Newcastle Knights, Sydney Roosters and Wests Tigers.
The Roosters were the biggest hit of those four clubs, taking a $40,000 hit from the NRL, $40,000 with $20,000 suspended for two years due to a lack of substantive notes of negotiation.
Nick Weeks, the NRL’s General Manager of Integrity, said that clubs risked losing more points and copping fines for not correctly reporting employee earnings.
Scott Prince, former halfback of the Titans who left the club in 2012, was paid more than his contract lodged with the NRL by a previous Titans administration said.
The difference in the actual contract figure and what was lodged with the NRL was never disclosed by the Titans administration previously in chard, or Prince. The Titans current management unearthed the discrepancy and self-reported it, and were not to blame according to Mr Weeks.
Prince will also relinquish his community roles in the game, and is unlikely to be seen in a role like that any time soon.
“Mr Prince’s role as an NRL One Community Ambassador expires this month and will not be renewed.”
The discrepancy appeared to be a one-off, according to the NRL’s statement.
“The investigation found no evidence of systemic rorting of the salary cap at the club.
“The suspended fine and points will be applied if there are any further salary cap breaches by the Titans over the next two years.”
Mr Weeks said the investigation into the Broncos, reported on earlier this year, yielded no evidence of breaches.
Weeks said it wasn’t possible to obtain information from the Broncos Leagues Club and former Broncos administrators who have left the game, and therefore the investigation was “impeded”.
“Given the evidence currently before us, there are former officials from both clubs who are unlikely to be registered to be involved in the NRL in the future,” he said.
He was confident that this draws a line in the sand about salary cap breaches in the game.
“All clubs are on notice that we have drawn a line in the sand.
“If clubs breach the salary cap in the future they will face heavy penalties, including the loss of competition points.”
Here are the other penalties for salary cap breaches in 2013:
Sea Eagles ($6,000 –overspend breach)
Knights ($35,519 – overspend breach)
Roosters ($40,000 – comprised of $20,000 fine and $20,000 suspended for two years.The penalty relates to a lack of substantive notes of negotiation)
Tigers ($9,326 – NYC overspend)
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