Cronulla veteran Ava Seumanufagai may be the unlucky Shark who makes way to allow for the club to be salary cap compliant for the 2019 NRL season.

The Sharks were slapped with a $353,000 cap fine by the NRL for seasons 2019 and 2020, meaning they'll have to offload one player before round one begins.

The fine comes on the back of CEO Barry Russell self-reporting salary cap problems dating back to the 2013 season.

Cronulla were hit with an initial $750,000 fine, although the NRL discounted the fine down to just $250,000 given Russell's honesty.

According to the Daily Telegraph, the Sharks have been preparing for the news for a long time, which will allow them to keep a marquee player on their books, and instead release a lesser-paid player.

Seumanufagai seems to be that man, with Leeds in the UK Super League interested in his services.

The 27-year-old is off-contract this season, but wants to stay in the NRL, although understands his options may be limited in 2019, given the Sharks' impressive crop of young forwards.

6 COMMENTS

  1. The Sharks and Storm are both over the cap, so why do they think they can choose who to give away. Being over the cap puts you in a much worse position than being under the cap. If I were St George or whoever else has the money, I would tell Cronulla and Melbourne to put someone more substantial on the table if they want to make a sale, like Dale Finucane or Matt Prior.

  2. “Cronulla were hit with an initial $750,000 fine, although the NRL discounted the fine down to just $250,000 given Russell’s honesty.”

    What they don’t tell you is that at the same time the NRL levied this 250k fine they also reduced the 800k fine they got before Christmas down to 350k.

    Nett 200k better off after these penalties.

  3. The “TRANSIT LOUNGE” club souffffths would be more than happy to accommodate the Cronulla reject. Souffffths have had 18 players come and go this off season—-

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