Arabic version: قائدة كرونولا تحث على رواتب بدوام كامل وموسم أطول لـ إن آر إل دبليو
Cronulla captain Tiana Penitani-Gray says the new NRL broadcast deal should end financial insecurity for NRLW players and enable full-time contracts for women in the game.
According to ABC News, the NRL has announced a $5.3 billion broadcast deal and the agreement governing NRLW salary caps and minimum wages, in force since 2023, will expire at the end of the 2027 season.
The current agreement gradually increased female players’ minimum wage from $30,000 to $50,600 per season, taking a team’s total salary to more than $1.5 million by 2027. By contrast, the top 30 male players in every NRL club will collectively earn $12.1 million that year, figures that players point to when calling for a larger salary cap and full-time roles.
Canterbury-Bankstown captain Tayla Preston said lengthening the NRLW season would boost game quality and reduce injury risk: “We have such a long off-season, girls are going to come and pick up injuries quite quickly,” she said. “We’d love to have a bigger pre-season … because some of us might take a couple of rounds to get going. You kind of don’t have that time on your side.”
Penitani-Gray said she wanted an expanded salary cap and full-time players to come from the broadcast deal: “Being able to expand the salary cap, being able to make the women players full time is definitely a step in the right direction,” she said. “Take away financial insecurity, take away having to juggle multiple jobs or study alongside the expectation of putting out a professional product.”
From a three-round debut NRLW season in 2018 featuring just four teams, the tournament now boasts 12 clubs playing nine regular fixtures and a three-week finals period.
On his second-last day at the helm, outgoing NRL CEO Andrew Abdo said the broadcast deal “isn’t just about investment, which only enables the salary cap to grow, but it’s also going to fuel the growth of the number of teams that we have … taking it to new markets and winning new fans.” Players warned that expansion should be managed and underpinned by investment in pathways and development to avoid a lopsided competition: “Expansion, but the right kind of expansion, not always adding new teams,” Penitani-Gray said. “We probably need to invest a little bit more in pathways and development to be able to bring up that level of athletes.”
Negotiations on a new NRLW salary and conditions deal are yet to begin; the infusion of broadcast money and the impending expiry of current agreements mean those talks will be closely watched for changes to minimum wages, team salary caps, season length and the prospect of more full-time contracts.
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