PENRITH boss Warren Wilson has revealed the Panthers are open to discussing a cap on football department spending but only if the NRL puts a range of other measures on the table.

The Daily Telegraph on Wednesday revealed worrying figures on the financial health of the 16 NRL clubs, with only three clubs generating a profit in 2015, according to the figures quoted.

Wilson disputed the $6.4 million loss quoted by the report for Penrith, telling foxsports.com.au: “We will be nothing near that when our books come in ... Our annual loss will be very very close to nothing.”

However Wilson conceded that some clubs are struggling financially and they need to be open to changes to ensure a healthy competition going forward.

Round 19

“Effectively it needs to be a whole of game approach,” Wilson said.

With a salary cap in place to equalise the talent on rosters across the competition, there is some concern among powerbrokers at the NRL that an arms race to get the best support staff, best equipment and best facilities will continue to open the gap between wealthy clubs like the Broncos and South Sydney and those struggling to make ends meet.

Wayne Bennett is a big football department cost for the Broncos. Source: Getty Images

Currently there is a huge gap — more than $1 million-a-year — between the salaries paid to the best coaches in the game, headed by Wayne Bennett, and the salaries paid to the lesser credentialed coaches, generally hired by the less wealthy clubs.

That same scenario is mirrored across a gammit of areas that includes assistant coaches, medical staff and sports science technology.

The NRL is understood to have staged preliminary talks with clubs about a cap that would limit football department spending in order to close that gap but the finer details of the proposal are still a long way off.

“I have no idea how much they’re talking about limiting it by,” Wilson told foxsports.com.au.

“And which part are they going to limit? Are they going to limit the commercial side, or are they going to limit the football side? What are they going to limit?

“I am open to a logical discussion on all funding at all levels of the NRL.”

Wilson and many of the other club CEOs are still dissatisfied with the funding arrangement currently in place between the clubs and the NRL.

Peace of sorts between an angry bloc of clubs and the NRL was brokered at a meeting in December when the clubs’ demands for a larger share of the pie were met.

However Wilson said that could all end up going to the players as the salary cap is increased, with no system yet in place to stop the players’ share eating into the clubs’ share.

“We don’t know what the final figure is going to be, so what we the clubs have said to head office is effectively you need to have the players on a percentage (of the total revenue generated by the NRL) and you need to have clubs on a percentage and head office runs on a percentage,” Wilson said.

Phil Gould and Anthony Griffin would be paid under a potential football department cap. Source: News Corp Australia

“You live within those means. The problem is that one part (of the agreement on revenue share) gets done and then you wake up the next morning and another part’s been done and what happened yesterday’s all been wiped out.”

If that “problem” is solved, Wilson believes the clubs would come to the table on a range of savings measures.

“They should put everything on the table and they should have an adult conversation that just puts everything up for grabs including head office expenditure and everything else so we all basically get the same,” Wilson said.

“The players’ association should be in it at the same time.

“At the moment it’s only piecemeal on the table. These conversations are all limited then they (the NRL) throw up a few graphs and it’s all over.”