{"id":938832,"date":"2026-10-24T04:06:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-24T04:06:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/938832\/"},"modified":"2026-10-24T04:06:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-24T04:06:12","slug":"nrl-news-2026-canterbury-bulldogs-boss-phil-gould-clears-up-situation-around-matt-burtons-playing-future-off-contract-star-to-explore-options","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/938832\/","title":{"rendered":"NRL news 2026: Canterbury Bulldogs boss Phil Gould clears up situation around Matt Burton\u2019s playing future | Off-contract star to explore options"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bulldogs<\/a> supremo Phil Gould<\/a> has moved to clear up the situation around Matt Burton<\/a>\u2019s playing future after it was revealed the star back had requested to test his value on the open market early.<\/p>\n

Nine\u2019s Danny Weidler revealed on Friday that Burton, who is contracted to Canterbury until the end of 2027, had asked the Bulldogs via his manager for permission to explore his options before becoming a free agent on November 1.<\/p>\n

\"SYDNEY,<\/p>\n

Matt Burton.\u00a0Getty Images<\/p>\n

Weidler said Burton wanted to get a head start on the other gun centres set to test the open market, among whom are Latrell Mitchell<\/a> and Herbie Farnworth<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust for the record, so everyone is on the same page,\u201d Gould, Canterbury\u2019s general manager of football, wrote on X in response to Weidler\u2019s report.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe love Matt Burton \u2026 We want to keep him \u2026 Matt Burton loves the Bulldogs \u2026 He wants to stay \u2026 That\u2019s not in question here at all.<\/p>\n

\u201cMatt\u2019s management doesn\u2019t want Matt underpaid \u2026 Bulldogs don\u2019t want Matt overpaid \u2026 That\u2019s both parties being responsible.<\/p>\n

\u201cSimple solution \u2026 Let the market tell us what the true value might be \u2026 Then we can have a more informed discussion.\u201d<\/p>\n

Burton was shifted from five-eighth to the centres midway through the 2026 season, with Stephen Crichton taking on the No.6 role and partnering young gun Lachlan Galvin in the halves.<\/p>\n

Centres are typically paid less money than halves in the NRL, so it\u2019s likely Burton\u2019s positional switch has factored in his desire to look around.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo this point, neither Matt\u2019s management, nor the Bulldogs, have spoken about money,\u201d Gould added.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want to do what\u2019s right by both parties.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve known Matt since he first came to Panthers from Dubbo.\u201d<\/p>\n

Burton won a premiership with Penrith in 2021 and then made the move to Canterbury, where he has played 114 first-grade games.<\/p>\n

He has made three State of Origin appearances for NSW since joining the Bulldogs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bulldogs supremo Phil Gould has moved to clear up the situation around Matt Burton\u2019s playing future after it…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":938833,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-938832","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\/938832","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=938832"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/938832\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/938833"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=938832"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=938832"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=938832"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}