MELBOURNE, April 29 (Reuters) – Former Melbourne Storm chief executive Brian Waldron has apologised for his role in a salary cap scandal which saw the club stripped of two National Rugby League championships and ended his career in sport.
Under Waldron’s watch, Storm systematically rorted the top-flight Australian league’s salary restrictions over a period of years in which the club clinched the 2007 and 2009 titles.
When the depth of the scandal was revealed in 2010, both titles were declared forfeit by the NRL and the club slapped with a huge fine while being made to play out most of the season for no championship points.
Waldron, who had crossed to the Melbourne Rebels in 2010, was promptly sacked by the new Super Rugby side and kept silent on the scandal.
“Regretfully I got ahead of myself,” he wrote in a column on sports leadership on website, The New Daily. “It’s absolutely appropriate that I apologise to all those hurt by my actions and I do so without reservation.
“Responsibility for failure is rarely exclusive but it is appropriate that responsibility is attributed to leaders. This is just.
“Leaders are accountable whether by their actions, their inactions or their naivety. Be it about salary cap breaches, recruitment errors, coaching appointments or the pursuit of scientific advantage, the buck stops at the top.”
The Storm were found to have exceeded the NRL’s salary cap by over A$3 million ($2.78 million) through third-party payments and other inducements and hiding the transactions with an elaborate dual book-keeping system.
Despite the scheme’s sophistication and a protracted investigation, the players and coaching staff were cleared of wrongdoing.
Though rocked by the scandal, the Storm recovered to win the 2012 championship two years later.
($1 = 1.0796 Australian Dollars) (Writing by Ian Ransom; Editing by Greg Stutchbury)
Article source: http://www.independent.ie/sport/rugby/tv3-secures-rights-to-2015-rugby-world-cup-30187579.html
Rugby league-Disgraced Storm chief apologises for salary scandal
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