{"id":867998,"date":"2026-08-25T15:30:18","date_gmt":"2026-08-25T15:30:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/867998\/"},"modified":"2026-08-25T15:30:18","modified_gmt":"2026-08-25T15:30:18","slug":"nrl-2026-will-jacob-prestons-contract-extension-force-others-out-of-the-canterbury-bulldogs-viliame-kikau-burton-gould-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/867998\/","title":{"rendered":"NRL 2026: Will Jacob Preston\u2019s contract extension force others out of the Canterbury Bulldogs, Viliame Kikau, Burton, Gould"},"content":{"rendered":"

News of Jacob Preston\u2019s contract extension will no doubt please Bulldogs fans, but could it cost them another star player?<\/p>\n

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Preston will be at the Bulldogs until at least the end of 2031 and it\u2019s seen as a major coup for the club.<\/p>\n

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But they had to pay more than they wanted to keep the 24-year-old after he knocked back a three-year deal worth $1.9 million last week.<\/p>\n

The Bulldogs\u2019 new offer of $3 million over four years was much more to Preston and his team\u2019s liking and he signed on the dotted line on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou know how much he means to the Bulldogs and the future of that club. He\u2019s a player that they couldn\u2019t afford to lose,\u201d journalist David Riccio said on NRL 360 on Tuesday night. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey were always confident they\u2019d keep him, and there was certainly a lot of haggling.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Bulldogs will now have to spend at least an extra $200,000 of their salary cap on Preston each year.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that\u2019s fair enough. I think it was justifiable. A four-year deal, it\u2019s a big win for the Dogs,\u201d Riccio said.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s just a top-notch footballer. He\u2019s a representative player of the future, and they\u2019ve signed a good one,\u201d fellow journalist Paul Crawley added. <\/p>\n

Burton silencing contract talk | 01:11<\/p>\n

NRL 360 host Braith Anasta questioned if Preston\u2019s deal might affect the future of other star players at the club.<\/p>\n

Despite having two more years left on his lucrative contract, Anasta asked about the future of Viliame Kikau.<\/p>\n

Spending so much money on two second rowers could throw their cap out of whack.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s going to be interesting because if you go through the majority of the NRL clubs, you don\u2019t find too many NRL clubs with circa $700,000, $800,000 back rowers on both sides of the field,\u201d Riccio said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s usually just one dominant highly paid backrower and the rest in the mid mid-$400,000s.\u201d<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no doubt Preston\u2019s big upgrade will force someone out and general manager Phil Gould knows how to move on players.<\/p>\n

It may put the future of Matt Burton under the spotlight.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s on big money but has been playing in the centres which isn\u2019t justifiable. <\/p>\n

Jacob Preston has signed again with the Canterbury Bulldogs.Source: Getty Images<\/p>\n

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Riccio said he didn\u2019t believe there were ratchet clauses in Preston\u2019s contract which is a positive for the club.<\/p>\n

He suggested Cameron Ciraldo may move Kikau into the front row to ensure so much money wasn\u2019t spent in one position. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s going to be interesting. Kikau is probably the most versatile, he\u2019s certainly big enough to play in the middle of the field. That way the Dogs don\u2019t have to go searching for more strike through the middle, going to market for a forward,\u201d Riccio said. <\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe you can justify the money if you\u2019re played back in the middle. I think it\u2019s going to be interesting to see.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou look through the NRL and I challenge all the viewers out there to go and have a look at the squads and have a look at the pairings of backrowers, see just one who is highly paid. <\/p>\n

Bulldogs Fighting to Keep Season Alive | 00:42<\/p>\n

Anasta said the Bulldogs would have to continue paying the big bucks if they wanted to extend Kikau\u2019s contract before he can go to market next year.<\/p>\n

Kikau\u2019s not going to go, \u2018okay, I\u2019ll move into the middle and I\u2019ll take less\u2019. It\u2019s not how it works. They\u2019re going to have to pay him. He is still playing as good as ever,\u201d Anasta said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"News of Jacob Preston\u2019s contract extension will no doubt please Bulldogs fans, but could it cost them another…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":867911,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-867998","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\/867998","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=867998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/867998\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/867911"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=867998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=867998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=867998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}