Canterbury veteran Aiden Tolman claims Bulldogs players are united in their desire to have Corey Harawira-Naera and Jayden Okunbor back at the NRL club.
The banned pair learned this week they could return to the field this year, with their independent appeal over the NRL’s deregistration of their contracts a success.
Neither have been around the Canterbury club or training since March, when news of a sex scandal involving Port Macquarie schoolgirls broke.
The duo are set to meet with Bulldogs officials this week to negotiate whether they will return, after the club initially supported the move to have their contracts torn up.
Once sorted, Harawira-Naera will be able to return to the NRL from next week, while Okunbor will have to wait until round 15.
It’s believed Harawira-Naera could attract interest from elsewhere, and is far from a certainty to stay at the Bulldogs after signing a four-year deal at the end of 2018.
Meanwhile Okunbor would be far more likely to stay, having come through the grades as a Canterbury junior.
And if their teammates had their way, they would welcome them back with open arms under interim coach Steve Georgallis.
“From a playing point of view, and all the players are in agreeance, we want them back,” Tolman said.
“For us as players, if the NRL believes they have done their time and that is the penalty warranted then we want them back here and playing.
“But I think the club and the players themselves and management have to negotiate now what the outcome is and what they want to do.”
Neither Harawira-Naera or Okunbor have seen their teammates since March, with players having spent the majority of that time in a bubble.
If they were to return to the squad, they would needed to be added into the Bulldogs’ bubble after living outside of the NRL’s biosecurity laws for the past four months.
It means neither of the pair have yet had the chance to address the Bulldogs squad as a group.
“We text, we phone call and they are close to a lot of the boys here. They have been in contact,” Tolman said.
“From our point of view as a playing group we definitely want them back.”
At the time of their deregistration, the Bulldogs backed the NRL’s decision and claimed the pair’s behaviour “demonstrated an unacceptable lack of respect”.
The scandal was also understood to have cost the club a $2 million sponsorship deal with restaurant chain Rashays, with the club still without a major naming rights partner.
The NRL have also said this week they are disappointed with the findings of the independent appeals committee, but accepted the decision.
