newcastle knight pleads guilty, page-65

No Safaris, he would not have been on anywhere near that over his career. Firstly, being a NZ junior and coming through the system, he would have been lucky to have made 100k in his first few years of first grade. His retainer for being in the full time squad would have been about 60k plus first grade incentives, usually around 2k a game in your first years.

He played 1 first game for NZ in 2010, so i would say from 2011 to 2013 his contract would have been close to 200k, possibly slight less.

Let's not forget he has been mostly an interchange player and not a regular NZ international player.

Considering he has to pay tax, plus 6% to his manager, i don't think he is anywhere near as rich as you think. He would have had only 2 years of decent money.

He would have come to Newcastle for 300ish k. Wayne Bennett is notorious for not paying too much for front rowers (ask Petro and Shane Webke). So, my guess is Packer wasn't on a hell of a lot in NZ because it would not be worth coming here for the cost of living and moving your family away from NZ.

Unless you are a superstar at young age, you don't get a hell of a lot initially and clubs wary to lock you in to long term deals when you are young. And Packer is no superstar.

My guess is this will crush them financially considering i have no doubts he would have made financial commitments based on his new "lucrative" contract.

Put anyone behind bars for 2 years and it has to have a devastating effect on a family's commitments.