New Zealand Warriors coach Andrew Webster has poured cold water on the idea that his club is chasing Penrith Panthers halfback Nathan Cleary, telling reporters this week that the Warriors have had no contact with the player or his management and could not legally have that conversation even if they wanted to.
The speculation has been building for weeks on social media and in the Australian league press, fed by the simple fact that Cleary’s deal at Penrith runs to the end of 2027 and that he becomes free to talk to rival clubs from 1 November. Add in the Auckland connection, and the story more or less writes itself. Webster’s response was that there is nothing to write.
“We’re definitely not in talks with Nathan Cleary and none of his representation have contacted us – and it’s not even legal,” Webster said, in comments reported by RNZ. “It can’t even happen.”
That last point matters more than the denial itself. Under NRL rules, clubs cannot open negotiations with a contracted player until the November window, which is still more than three months away. Any club that did so would be exposing itself to a sanction. So while a coach declaring “We’re definitely not in talks with Nathan Cleary” is the sort of line that gets treated with a raised eyebrow in rugby league, in this case the calendar backs him up.
Webster did not pretend to be baffled by the rumour. He acknowledged, with some good humour, why the idea has legs. “I see the romance in that scenario,” he said. “He went to school here, he was a ballboy here – I can see why they would put two and two together, but there’s certainly nothing in that at all.”
The romance is real enough. Cleary spent part of his childhood in Auckland while his father Ivan was coaching the Warriors, and he was around Mt Smart as a kid. His younger brother Jett is now on the Warriors’ books. For a club that has spent three decades being told it cannot attract or keep the very best players, the notion of the game’s premier halfback choosing to come home is close to the perfect fantasy. It is also, on Webster’s account, entirely a fantasy for now.
Cleary is not the only name Webster had to bat away. Reports have also linked the Warriors with Joseph Manu, the former Sydney Roosters and All Blacks centre who has been weighing up a return to league. Webster said the club is not speaking to either player’s management, and suggested Manu looks more likely to end up at the incoming Papua New Guinea franchise than at Mt Smart. The NZ City report of Webster’s comments carried the same message, that the coach is not talking to either camp.
Where Webster was more forthcoming was on the player the Warriors already have and would very much like to keep. Hooker Wayde Egan has been the subject of interest from other NRL clubs, and Webster made it clear the Warriors have no intention of letting him walk. Egan has been one of the more consistent performers in the pack over the past few seasons, and in a competition where quality dummy halves are scarce, losing him would hurt considerably more than failing to land a name the club was never realistically going to sign.
There is a wider point in all this about how the recruitment rumour cycle now works. A player’s contract end date becomes public. A journalist notes that a club has salary cap room. Someone connects the two on a podcast, it gets clipped, and within a day it is a story that a head coach has to answer at a press conference in the middle of a season that actually matters. Webster’s mild irritation at having to spend part of a match-week media session denying something that cannot legally be happening was fairly plain.
The Warriors have rather more pressing business. They face the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs at Accor Stadium in Sydney on Saturday evening in round 21, with the Bulldogs chasing a place inside the top eight and the Warriors looking to hold their position near the top of the ladder. The Bulldogs’ own team news for the round names Stephen Crichton and Bronson Xerri among their inclusions, while the Warriors have named Luke Metcalf, Marata Niukore and Rocco Berry.
It has not been an entirely quiet week off the field for the club. In the women’s competition, Warriors winger Lavinia Tauhalaliku has been stood down for two matches after the NRLW issued a breach notice over an off-field altercation last summer, for which no charges were laid. She leads the competition in tries. The suspension overlaps with a period she was already expected to miss while her clearance to enter Australia was sorted out, which softens the blow slightly, and opens the door for Payton Takimoana to return from a shoulder injury.
As for Cleary, the honest position is that nobody outside a small circle knows what he will do, and that includes anyone at Mt Smart. From 1 November, clubs can ask him. Until then, everything said publicly about it is guesswork dressed up as reporting, and Webster has now said so about as directly as a coach can.
What do you make of the Cleary speculation, and would you want the Warriors to make a play for him in November? Have your say in the comments below.
This article was written by AI, briefed to report the facts, hopefully without some of the bias people bring to the job 🙂
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