Leeds Rhinos launch salary cap dispensation bid as Salford Red Devils crisis takes new twist

Salford have been ordered by the RFL to sell players in a bid to make savings of around £800,000. Now Rhinos are leading a new bid to give clubs who have already spent their full salary cap the option to recruit from the Manchester side.

Rhinos chief executive Gary Hetherington is on a family holiday in Australia, but has been involved in Super League discussions about the Salford crisis. He told The Yorkshire Evening Post he is hopeful a takeover can be completed which would solve their financial problems, but if not, some form of salary cap dispensation will be needed - and Leeds will propose a possible solution at a meeting on Wednesday.

Hetherington said: “The RFL, who effectively have taken charge of Salford, put a resolution to Super League clubs last week that would effectively have given everybody dispensation [to sign Salford players]. If you’re a club that has not spent your salary cap allowance, then you don’t need dispensation, but it would have given clubs that have already spent up - like Leeds, Warrington, Wigan and St Helens presumably - dispensation to sign a player from Salford.

“In doing so, it increases Salford’s chances of survival because it means they can offload some players, get transfer fees and offload the wages. That proposal was defeated, voted down.

“The clubs are coming together again this week and will be further considering the Salford situation. We have made an amendment to that proposal to say clubs with spare salary cap capacity should have first option to sign Salford players.

“There should be a window of maybe several weeks for that to happen and subsequently if Salford still need to sign players beyond that period, then there should be a dispensation - for 2025 only - to all clubs to sign one player from Salford. That in many ways flies in the face of what we’ve been advocating, which is we’ve got to exert more cost control, not increase spending, but the priority here is to keep Salford solvent.”

Former Rhinos captain Kallum Watkins would be a possible target for Leeds if dispensation was granted. Hetherington admitted there is “very strong feeling on this subject”, adding: “Clubs are saying it is a totally self-inflicted situation - they have over-spent without having the income to support that spending. In the past, other clubs - like Castleford last year - have had to manage the best way they could; they didn’t over-spend and they’ve kept themselves afloat. Salford should have done the same.

“So there’s some clubs who don’t have much sympathy for them, but at the end of the day, for the integrity of the game and the competition and everything that goes with it, it is important we all do as much as we can to keep Salford afloat.”

An Australian-based group, with an NRL background, are believed to be interested in gaining ownership of Salford, who are due to play Leeds in their first home game this season, on Saturday, February 22. A takeover would negate the need to sell players and Hetherington stressed: “If they get new owners who want to retain the squad they’ve got and they can financially underpin Salford for the rest of the season, that is the ideal solution.”