Souths must stand up and use Haas signing: Murray
Scott Bailey |
Cameron Murray has challenged South Sydney players to make the most of Payne Haas’s looming arrival, insistent it is on them to determine how transformative the superstar prop’s signing is.
Haas’s mega deal for 2027 and beyond remained the talking point of the NRL season launch on Tuesday, with the bombshell move announced just a month out from Brisbane beginning their title defence.
The Broncos have until next week to try and convince Haas to renege on the deal, after the Rabbitohs lodged the three-year contract with the NRL on Sunday ahead of the 10-day cooling off period.
The front-rower spent Tuesday flying to London for the World Club Challenge with Brisbane teammates, who were shocked by the announcement over the weekend.
So too were Souths’ stars, unaware of Wayne Bennett’s pursuit of the NRL’s best prop after the former Broncos coach handed the 26-year-old his first NRL contract a decade ago.
Haas’s arrival at the Rabbitohs is undoubtedly one of the club’s biggest signings of this century.
Greg Inglis’s move from Melbourne to Redfern in 2011 is widely considered the Bunnies’ most transformative signing since their 2002 readmission, taking them from perennial battlers to a drought-breaking premiership.
Sam Burgess’s 2010 arrival and and Michael Crocker’s signing from the Storm the previous year also played a role in that, making the Rabbitohs an attractive option on the market.
But Haas has the potential to trump all of those signings, given he is the clear best forward in the game with half a career still ahead of him.
“I’ll leave the how big it is and how transformative it’ll be to the commentators on the sidelines,” Murray said.
“For us, it’s about making the most of that type of signing. Not thinking that success is just going to come because we’ve got a signature on a contract.
“It’s about earning the right and living the values that we stand for at the club and continuing some of the great legacies that have been here at the club.
“Like the Greg Inglis’s and the Sam Burgess’s and stuff like that … But that’s something to think about next year.”
The Rabbitohs have not played finals since 2022, with a late-season fade out in 2023 followed by two injury-ravaged seasons.
But Murray believed the club had still been attractive to potential suitors, with David Fifita also brought south by Bennett for this year.
“I don’t think the results are reflective of the club that we are and the culture and the values that we stand for,” Murray said.
“Obviously now we’ve got Wayne back, who’s sort of leading that fight back to where we think we belong and where we think we’re capable of finishing as a club.
“I would like to think even before Payne signed, it was still a desirable club for people to come to. We’ve got a lot of draws to our club.”
AAP
