Former National Rugby League side Melbourne Storm CEO Mark Evans "is halfway through his review of the NRL's third party payments."
Evans "has met with some clubs as the NRL explore the prospect of reworking the code's third party payments system which has seen a rising disparity in what some clubs spend on players outside the salary cap." It is understood third party payments total more than A$10M ($7.3M) each year. Evans "hinted at simplifying the current system." He said,
"We've got some improvements that could be made. I'm testing a few ideas against a few people in the game. Hopefully, in the next few weeks I will be able to make a proposal" (SYDNEY MORNING HERALD, 10/14). ... Key figures, and "sometime adversaries," in the Australian Football League's unresolved drugs scandal "are converging for an exclusive audience with the World Anti-Doping Agency's boss at a three-day sports law conference."
The AFL is sending five representatives to the A$1,200 ($875) per head annual conference of the Australian and New Zealand Sports Law Association where WADA's David Howman "is a highly topical keynote speaker in the countdown to a Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) hearing that will determine whether or not Essendon players will be banned for use of outlawed drugs."
Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority CEO Ben McDevitt and three senior legal advisers from government-funded ASADA "are among other registered conference attendees." Lawyers who have represented Essendon players, the club's former coach James Hird and ASADA in the most high-profile drugs probe in the history of Australian sport "will also be present" -- among them Tony Nolan QC and Ben Ihle (SMH, 10/14).
