Phil Gould has labelled the Titans’ decision to sign David Fifita on a contract worth $1.25 million a season “reckless” and declared it has disrupted the market for the entire NRL.
The Titans stunned the competition when they lured a 20-year-old Fifita away from the Broncos on a monster deal worth $3.65 million
The backrower has since struggled to live up to the price tag and found himself in and out of the Titans starting side.
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Speaking on Six Tackles with Gus Podcast, Gould said Fifita had created a “false economy”.
“If you go back in time to when they signed him, I said it was an irresponsible signing,” Gould said.
“$1.25 million for a 20-year-old backrower is reckless spending.
“It actually caused problems with the whole player market and the values in the market,”
“When you get an outlier purchase like that where someone goes and pays a ridiculous amount of money for a young backrower, then the other backrowers, forwards, halves, five-eighths and fullbacks in the competition say, ‘Well if he’s worth that, what am I worth?’ It created a whole false economy.
Gould said while he didn’t want to be too critical of Fifita, ultimately his contract had been detrimental to the game.
“If you go out and you pay $1.2 million on a rookie forward who’s played 30 games because he scores a try every now and then, then what’s James Tedesco worth? What’s Nathan Cleary worth?
“I don’t want to single David out. It’s not his fault he’s on that money. But it was harmful to the game.”
Fifita is off contract at the end of next season with the Dragons reportedly among a host of clubs interested.
Gould, however, said none of the chasing teams should be paying Fifita at the same rate.
“What you’ve got at the moment is a player on big money, with a big profile and they play him off the bench,” Gould said.
“You can’t have a bench player on that sort of money!”
