Luai update!
One of my close friends who’s close to the operations around Penrith claims they’re increasingly confident that Luai will remain at the club beyond this year. He also stated even if Luai signs with us for 2025 there’s no chance they’ll entertain a trade to release him early. Luai has asked for another year on his Penrith deal and apparently stated to Penrith management that 2 years isn’t good enough. Penrith now have the ball in their court and are most likely going to offer the 3rd year and they believe if they do a deal will get done.
Bulldogs interest has died off - they’re gonna go all out on AFB for next year and he most likely will end up there is the word around the street. However, this isn’t mail but if we were to have a successful year next year and we show signs of life I wouldn’t rule us out. Early word though is he’ll end up a bulldog.
However, my source at the club who pretty much has had like a 95% success rate also believes that we’re pretty confident we can get a deal done as well. In terms of how Benji/Luai’s discussions have been throughout that has been made confidential as Benji doesn’t want anything getting out from that regard.
Overall, it’s between us or Penrith. Both clubs have confidence they can get a deal done. If he was to sign with us for 2025 don’t expect a 2024 early release regardless on who we offer. On the field there isn’t a rivalry between both clubs if we’re being unbiased as Penrith are on another level currently - however off the field, these two clubs don’t like each other.
Side note: My source at the club who broke the Olam/Blore potential deal to me before it went public has reaffirmed that the deal isn’t dead but has stalled due to $ purposes.
Both Blore/Olam had verbally agreed to join respective clubs and it looked like a deal was done. However, Melbourne who’re renowned for being difficult to deal with in these situations don’t want to budge on how much they’ll offer.
The club however are patient and want to revisit this deal again sometime throughout the season, if Olam isn’t playing any game time you’d be silly to not try get him off your books. There’s also whispers going around that the club want to throw Junior Tupou in the centres come round 1 next year.