Cherry-Evans deal overshot salary cap

NRL salary cap investigators found the Manly Sea Eagles cheated in convincing skipper Daly Cherry Evans to backflip on the Gold Coast Titans in 2015 in a deal that was so suspect their then chief executive threatened to quit.

Cherry Evans agreed to an eight-year $10 million contract — at the time the most lucrative in NRL history — to play out his career at the Sea Eagles.

However, the money registered in salary cap documents was $400,000 less than what he was actually being paid.

There is no suggestion Cherry Evans knew of the discrepancy in a deal done between his manager and Manly officials.

However, then chief executive Joe Cross was so concerned he refused to sign off on Cherry Evans’ contract and offered his resignation.

Instead chairman and owner Scott Penn signed off on the deal before it was registered.

Manly also secured the signature of centre Dylan Walker from the South Sydney Rabbitohs under a similar outside-cap arrangement.

In 800,000 pages of documents captured from mobile phones and computer hard drives, the NRL found 13 players had been paid outside the cap over five years.

Five of them were serious breaches, the rest minor, such as free cars that were supposed to have been included.