It’s official – Stephen Crichton will be a Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldog in 2024 with the two-time premiership-winning Penrith centre to ink a four-year deal in excess of $3.3 million.
In the latest major recruitment coup for Canterbury-Bankstown’s rebuild under new coach Cameron Ciraldo, Crichton will become the third member of Penrith’s premiership-winning squad in blue and white joining Matt Burton and Viliame Kikau next season.
The Bulldogs have been smart in playing the long game by sitting back and waiting for Crichton to become available on the open market.
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Once that happened on Monday, Canterbury-Bankstown kingpin Phil Gould and Ciraldo have quickly moved to ensure Crichton will be at Belmore in 2024.
Whether Crichton plays fullback or in the centres with the Bulldogs is still to be determined but what is not up for debate is the strength of Canterbury-Bankstown’s roster rolling forward.
In a further warning sign for premiers Penrith as they feel the salary cap squeeze of building success, young gun front rower Spencer Leniu is a strong chance of becoming the next member of the Panthers to also join the new-look Bulldogs.
Leniu, 22, is off contract at the end of this year and with rival clubs all looking to sharpen their rosters the Panthers are in danger of losing another pedigree local junior.
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Crichton’s departure to the Bulldogs next year will mean the Panthers have now lost eight players from the premiership-winning sides of the past two seasons – Burton, Kikau, Api Koroisau, Kurt Capewell, Charlie Staines, Paul Momorovski and Tyrone May.
But the enormous advantage the Panthers have is the world’s biggest rugby league junior nursery which saw eight local juniors feature in last year’s grand final side.
Prop forward Leniu was one of them and could easily become the latest example of the price of success the Panthers are now paying.
Good judges have long regarded Leniu as the prototype for the modern day front-row forward and in most other NRL sides there’s no question the Samoan international would be a starting prop.
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But the premiers have James Fisher-Harris – widely regarded as among the top three front rowers in the NRL – and Moses Leota as their starting front rowers.
Where it gets delicate is new Bulldogs coach Ciraldo has a handshake agreement with Panthers coach Ivan Cleary about refraining from raiding Penrith’s outstanding production line of talent.
In the case of Crichton, the Bulldogs were patient and it’s only been in the last 72 hours were a series of meetings with Gould and Ciraldo have paved the way for the move to Canterbury-Bankstown next year to be rubber-stamped.
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NRL players only asking for fair share | 01:25
Ciraldo did a nine-year apprenticeship at Penrith starting as an under 20s assistant coach in 2014 before graduating to work as Cleary’s right-hand man in the NRL over the course of the past five seasons.
The next order of business for the Bulldogs on the recruitment front will be whether halfback Mitchell Moses opts to leave Parramatta to join arch-rivals Canterbury for 2024.
The Wests Tigers also remain at the negotiating table in terms of trying to secure Moses with the Concord-based club believed to have tabled a deal worth around the $1.5 million per season mark.
The Eels are still also very much at the negotiating table with the prized No.7.
