{"id":748366,"date":"2026-06-20T07:23:12","date_gmt":"2026-06-20T07:23:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/748366\/"},"modified":"2026-06-20T07:23:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-20T07:23:12","slug":"nrl-news-2026-north-queensland-cowboys-coach-todd-payten-signs-two-year-contract-extension","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/748366\/","title":{"rendered":"NRL news 2026: North Queensland Cowboys coach Todd Payten signs two-year contract extension"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cowboys<\/a> coach Todd Payten<\/a> has been rewarded for a strong start to the season, officially putting pen to paper on a new two-year contract.<\/p>\n

After months of speculation, Payten\u2019s fresh deal will see him remain at the helm in North Queensland until the end of 2028. <\/p>\n

\"Cowboys<\/p>\n

Todd Payten will remain with the Cowboys.\u00a0Getty<\/p>\n

\u201cNorth Queensland is home for my family and I\u2019m thrilled to be able to extend for another two seasons,\u201d he said in a club statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love the club and the region because of the people within it.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am grateful to be leading this group of young men and we are committed to bringing the second premiership to North Queensland.\u201d<\/p>\n

Payten has been in charge of the Cowboys since 2021, leading them to the finals on two occasions. <\/p>\n

There had been calls for Payten to be axed after a poor 2025 campaign, but the Cowboys have returned to form this year.<\/p>\n

The side sits just outside the top-eight this season with eight wins and six losses.<\/p>\n

\u201cSuccessful organisations don\u2019t make short-sighted decisions and as a group we have taken the time to carefully assess the direction our club is heading,\u201d Cowboys chairman David Myles said in a statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cOver recent months we have seen significant growth in both our football program and the leadership of Todd.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile results are always important, our decision was based on much more than the ladder. We have seen clear improvement and alignment around standards, accountability, culture and the long-term direction of our club.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe board is confident Todd is the right person to lead our club into the future.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cowboys coach Todd Payten has been rewarded for a strong start to the season, officially putting pen to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":748367,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-748366","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/748366","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=748366"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/748366\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/748367"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=748366"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=748366"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=748366"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}