"The breakthrough in the investigation was the discovery by the salary cap auditor [Ian Schubert] and his team of a file in a separate room at the Storm to the room that contained the file with the players' contracts."

In statement released by the NRL, it was revealed that "the Storm maintained a dual contract system and the club has today confirmed that side letters promising extra payments were stored in a secret file at the home of the Chief Executive. The accounts were structured in such a way that it would appear the commitments were not apparent to either the Melbourne Storm Board or its owners."

Big Big story, If only the NBL had the stones to do something similar

Shh! We only just got the Kings back...

The Storm were fined $500,000, any club breaching under the BA run NBL will apparently be fined $1mill.

NBL have no interest in championship points, just need the money more! ;)

Huge sporting news this. And the storm have to play the remainder of this season for nothing!

were does the priemierships go

Apparently the premierships are now just voided. They're not passing them on to the runner ups.

Good to see a Cap with some nasty, sharp teeth!

Ah, scrubbing out recorded history. Nothing like hiding the truth behind a veil of lies in a hope that people will forget; kind of like how the Bible started.

...I wonder if the Bible was originally the history book of an ancient sporting league.

Fancy leaving that 2nd file findable. I bet someone cracked a beer to early & 4got to hide it in a locked safe where auditors cant find. Cheats should be punished & well done to the NRL. It goes on in every sport unfortunately.

Puts the lie to Melbourne being the new 'title town'! Now they only need to name and shame the tigers and dragons championship teams!

Bit harsh XY. Why not start with the Kings 3 peat? Though i'm sure Seamus is no saint. The Dragons wouldn't spend according to Hammer but went berserk under Goorg. Apparantly winning is everything!

Very tough to make a rule where even if Melbourne wins games this year, they can't get any points. This will just make the competition a joke if Melbourne end up with the most wins this year and finish on the bottom. If that is the case the team that wins it will be a hollow victory.
Taking away flags is also a joke, unless the players and coach were in on it, which i highly doubt they were.
They need a massive fine and take away draft picks for the next 5 years.
You cant punish the players for something the ceo and others did.

Good call metro man. I agree, The club should pay in draft picks. I personally dont rate rugby, But its crap for the fans that pay good money to go see them on the weekend when they know a win wont mean anything. Punish the CEO, not the players

NRL don't have a draft. It's all free agency. Players even sign for their next team during the season.

Also, players would have known they were breaking the rules:
"Here's your pay, oh, and heres your other pay...".
they would have been seperate payments.

What I'm wondering is what teams their opponents will field. You wouldn't risk your stars in a game that means nothing.

Not quite right chucker - their opponents don't automatially win, they still have to play them and beat them to earn premiership points. It's just that if Storm win,they don't get premiership points.

Actually the Storm have to pay 1.6million for rorting the system.

1.1million repayment of prizemoney they recieved for winning there premierships and a $500,000 fine.

To be honest not allowing them to recieve points is a joke, it pretty much screws the fans for the rest of the season. I believe they were 700k? over the salary cap, the NRL should've told them all current points are voided, any future games are also voided unless they terminate existing contracts(and pay the players who they terminate whats owed) and get back under the salary cap.

Of course players cut would be available to play for other teams.

good shit to the NRL. an example had to be made of Melbourne and they certainly did that.
wonder how many other teams CEO's have their paper shredders working overtime as we speak lol

They need to more heavily come down on individuals.

The CEO should be charged with tax evasion and taking to court for the full charge possible.

They should contact the ATO and ask them to go through each individual players finances and make them pay back taxes plus interest if they haven't fully paid their taxes.

And any player manager found to have been involved in organising under the counter payments should be banned from ever representing a player again.

This was individuals and not a club that acted inappropriately.

How far into the season is it for this league? If they lost the points accrued up until now, can they still make the playoffs? They are still a stacked team because of the salary cap breach. If they have enough time to still make playoffs, that gives them a good chance to win another premiership. That won't go down too well knowing they are in that position because of the team the club has bought. Its a difficult situation to be in. As far as the club goes, they cannot be given any opportunity to win another premiership but then again, the fans are innocently cheated of that privilege. The only way they can retaliate is by not going to any more of their games and if you have bought a season ticket, it should be refunded. Alternatively, the fans might be supportive enough and thinking about the long term support rather than giving up on them now.

The premierships of 2007 and 2009 should be awarded to the runner up because they worked their way up to the grand final against an illegally stacked team. They are the ones that were cheated of a premiership and deserve to win it. By not awarding the premiership to the runners up, 2 whole seasons would have been a waste for the teams that did the right thing. That's not really fair.

They will not receive any points for games won for the remainder of this year.

Award the premierships to the runners up - AFTER auditing them to make sure they didn't have cap breaches too.

The premierships of 2007 and 2009 should be awarded to the runner up because they worked their way up to the grand final against an illegally stacked team.

It's a good thing the NBL don't have the stones to pull off soemthing like this, otherwise we'd be removing the 1998 and 1999 trophies from our cabinet!

Billo, we got caught and fined for those breaches already. But we avoided the stripping of the trophies thank god.

The harshness of the reprise has been like a kick to the gut. I now know how the passer-bys must have felt as they happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and witnessed the execution of Jesus. You could have come and gone, for it lasted several days, but no matter what part of it you saw, you were changed.

Cabin fever has hit and there is no turning back now. The only chance of survival is to keep going, hoping that the fever will pass and a new found ability to master these social interactions will be found. From past experience it is known that they are sometimes found, though this experience has also tought that they are as often times never found. But what choice do we have? We have to keep walking, for if not to move is to stand still...and idle hands have been the death of enough poor bastards already. I've seen them fall and I will not be one of them.

Holy Jesus, why is it so cold in here?

In summary, what we have seen is harsh justice. And what is our reaction? Who are you with? This time will tell everything we need to know about you. Your replies will leave you standing naked and you all will be judged. Though some more kindly than others.

They were saying on the news tonight that Storm have nothing to play for for the rest of the season because they cant earn premiership points. That is definitely not the case. They still have their salaries (minus the under the table payments) and they have fans that will continue to support them. Its for the fans that they need to come out fighting even harder than they have until now because it will show they have the fans interest at heart and not just their pockets. The way they are perceived now at a time of crisis will make or break the club for the future. I cannot see how ignorant the players would have been to what was going on. They had to realise they were getting a little bit more.

Junga, In my best Jamaican accent: "Pass the Dutchie to the left hand side"
:)

Billo,

The hypocrisy of the NBL fining Adelaide for those salary cap breaches still puzzles me. As Anon astutely noted, all clubs have been participating in this sort of behavior for many years. I'm still unsure why a blind eye was not turned to the Sixers, unless it was extremely obvious (or bad) compared to all other clubs.

I still remember the legendary AC Earl in 1999 for the Sydney Kings. This guy was "employed" by Coca-cola as an "Executive Vice President". Now apparently AC wasn't the most business minded guy at the u of Iowa and graduated in lesiure studies but was still qualified enough (and had the time) to take a side job with the crumbles major sponsor.

Funny about that eh...

Have seen interviews on the news. Manly players and parramata players said that they don't want to be awarded the premierships of 2007 and 2009, because they wouldn't feel as though they earned them. Good response by both clubs IMO. At the end of the day they broke the rules..good move by David Gallopp..I laugh when I see the likes of Phil Gould dispute the NRLs ruling..what's there to dispute, they broke the rules which 15 other clubs all adhered to and managed effectively.

MACDUB, If Parramatta players and Manly players feel they haven't earned the 2007 & 2009 premierships, it is their privilege to have an opinion. They need to realise though that they are players and not the club. Players will move on but the club stays and therefore its the interest of the club that needs to be taken into consideration and not of individual players. I beg to differ on the opinion they did not earn it. That may have been the case when it happened and Storm were clearly the victors at the time without any knowledge of their cheating but now that the cheating has come to light, it throws a different conclusion on whether they earned it or not.

If the cheating had not occurred and Storm won fair and square then they deserved the premiership. If they didn't cheat and didn't do as well as a result of it, you could argue that it would not necessarily have been Manly and Parramatta fighting out the premiership. Under the circumstances, there has to be a recognition of the best team for those 2 years as all the games were played out by all the teams and all the work put into it to conclude the season in a premiership. As for the problems arising out of bets placed, I am not a gambling person, but I would imagine that the terms and condition of betting would cover things like this and placing your bet is an indication of you accepting the terms and conditions. Just like reading and posting on this forum