I would imagine a club as successful as Sarries would be able to attract players and pay lower salaries than clubs who rarely win trophies.
Should have made my point more succinctly - this is basically what I was getting at.
Whilst no one actually knows salaries, anyone who has followed rugby knows that there are benchmarks for levels of players - published yearly by Rugby magazines.
Put these benchmarks against their squad (once it is finalised) and you will see whether they are over this cap.
A group of us did this the year it was all hushed up and Sarries Leicester and Bath all seemed to be over the cap at the time.
It left a bitter taste when the Premiership caved in to Sarries bully boy tactics when they threaten to go to court. Hence the animosity of most rugby fans to Sarries and their spending
I get what you're saying but it's not an exact science is it? Where do the benchmarks come from? Based on what level of inside knowledge and what kind of sample size?
I'm not arguing that what Sarries did before was not unacceptable - I was just as angry to hear about the cover up as the next man. But we're now 4 years on from that point. I'd like to believe, until proven otherwise, that those clubs that were previously guilty are now playing by the rules. If they're not and it's evidently being done to gain an advantage - i.e. not just a balls-up in the accounts department - then there need to be consequences. As I would want there to be for Quins if we ever started playing in the muck. And it looks as though PRL have introduced points penalties this season - a tiered system for anything over £350k:
https://twitter.com/kean_thomas/status/1093099862172880897