Salford owner Marwan Koukash welcomes new marquee rule

Salford owner Marwan Koukash has welcomed the introduction of a marquee player in Super League for the 2016 season.

The controversial proposal, which had been rejected three times in the last two years, was finally given the go-ahead at the Super League annual meeting in Manchester on Wednesday.

Under the terms of the salary cap rule amendment, clubs will be entitled to sign one marquee player who will have a notional value on their salary cap register of either £100,000 if club trained or £175,000 if non-club trained.

Koukash, who originally proposed the move, told Sky Sports News HQ: "It was a great day for Super League. For the very first time, the sport can go out and compete with the NRL and rugby union for top-quality rugby players.

“Now teams like us, for example, can go out and bring in big, big names and bring them back to the sport.

Marquee players will enhance the sport. It will put more bums on seats, it will create more interest in the sport

“It’s probably the right time for it, and everybody recognises the need for it, because we have been losing our top talent into union, etc.

“You look at the example of Wigan recently, they have anticipated that the vote is going to be successful and straightway they have gone ahead and bought Sam Tomkins. We would have lost Sam Tomkins to the NRL forever had this vote not been possible.

“So the first thing we have done is to bring our best talent back into the competition, the talent we recently lost. We also have the opportunity to go out and compete and bring in other players from the NRL and even rugby union, players who switched from rugby league back to rugby union, bring them back to rugby league because we could afford to pay them.”

Four of the 12 Super League clubs voted against the proposal, but Koukash insists the change will not lead to the introduction of a two-tier system with the less wealthy clubs unable to compete.

“A player, or two players, doesn’t win you championships,” he said.

“You look at the way the league is now. In the top eight there are one or two teams who don’t even spend the full salary cap, whereas Salford, we spend the full cap, and we are not in the top eight.

“So with a marquee or two players it is not going to make much difference. It’s not going to make the ones who bring in the marquee players all of a sudden they lead, they are the ones who are going to be winning the championship.

“Marquee players will enhance the sport. It will put more bums on seats, it will create more interest in the sport and as a result the sport overall will grow.

“Whether the marquee players are coming into Wigan, or Salford, Warrington, Leeds, St Helens, it will be a positive influence for the whole of the sport, not just for the clubs that they are going to.”