High-profile rugby league player agents David Riolo and Issac Moses have had their appeals against six-month bans relating to Melbourne Storm's salary cap rorting dismissed on Friday. The pair will now be unable to represent or negotiate with clubs until March 28 next year - three weeks after the NRL season kicks off. Riolo and Moses manage some of the biggest names in the game including Australia and Queensland captain Cameron Smith, NSW skipper Paul Gallen, Canterbury-bound forward Tony Williams and out-of-favour Penrith centre Michael Jennings. The pair were given leave to continue to work pending their appeal - and managed to negotiate Williams' lucrative deal from Manly to the Bulldogs, Ben Te'o's transfer to South Sydney from Brisbane and Anthony Minichiello's re-signing at the Sydney Roosters. The Rugby League Accredited Player Agents Scheme's committee announced six-month suspensions of Riolo, Moses and George Mimis in April this year. The committee found that each of the agents had breached the rules of the scheme and the code of ethics for accredited agents for their role in the Storm's systematic rorting of the NRL salary cap from 2006-2010. Mimis, who heads the SFX Group and has high-profile clients Billy Slater, Brett Stewart and Justin Hodges, dropped his appeal against the ban in September this year - with his suspension expiring on October 31. Allan Gainey, who manages South Sydney and former Melbourne centre Greg Inglis, was issued with a caution in April but faced no suspension.
Token suspensions, pathetic. They breached a fundamental ethical responsibilty to the game and should all have been de-registered as player agents. The Storm scandal whitewash continues unabated. Yay for the new commission. Not.
I agree. Should have been banned for life. A ban til next march means nothing in the grand scheme of things. They'd just be directing someone else to do their work while they have a holiday til then. Ban them from all forms of representation.
I always liked 44 but for some reason they changed him to 13, was still the same character but his number changed???
What about the massive whinge and threats from Weedler yesterday? If Nasser Khoder doesn't want to become accredited then $BW had better find another manager.
Weirdler is a pathetic excuse for a journalist. He uses his column as a defacto PR service for $BW, Mundane and Team Khoder. It's all just propaganda, Weirdler is basically Khoder Nasser's puppet. He'll be doing Quade Coopers bidding in the media over the next few months, you can bet on that. Anyway if $BW is so honourable that he commits to handshake deals then he shouldn't need a contract nor an agent.
He shouldn't shake hands anymore - he's hurt his shoulder playing union in Japan. which is similar to my memory of him - maybe talented but injured a lot.
