News this week that the St George-Illawarra Dragons needed to release a number of players to get under the 2006 salary cap came as a surprise, especially as the club only just re-signed fullback Clint Greenshields to a one year deal and Luke Bailey to a similar deal just a few months earlier.
The Dragons are victims of their own success. The fact that so many of their players went on to play representative football and therefore enact clauses in their contracts that pay them more money for these achievements have sent the Dragons scrambling to release players.
Already young hooker Michael Ennis has been released with the Dragons saying that Ennis was having trouble settling in after moving to Sydney from Newcastle (Funny how Ennis then went on to sign with the Brisbane Broncos!).
Now its looks like both Shaun Timmins and Lance Thompson could find their heads on the chopping bloke.
Still, I have to wonder about the Dragons. Ive said before that I feel their management makes some dumb mistakes and this looks like another case of that being played out in public.
Its not just what will happen over this off season, if the club is struggling to get under the cap now, how on Earth are they going to stay under the cap looking towards 2007 when they have so many high profile players coming off contract.
