Melbourne coach Craig Bellamy says he would be open to releasing halfback Brodie Croft should he seek greener pastures at NRL rivals Brisbane.
Croft was on Thursday pictured with Broncos coach Anthony Seibold at a Sydney cafe, a meeting which caught Bellamy off-guard.
The Broncos have targeted the Dalby product to solve their playmaking woes after they were dumped from the finals in an embarrassing 58-0 loss to Parramatta.
Despite taking the club to a grand final last year and being earmarked as Cooper Cronk’s long-term replacement, Croft is surplus to requirement at the Storm after being usurped by Jahrome Hughes in their halves pecking order.
He was dumped three weeks before the finals and will not be involved in Saturday’s preliminary final against Sydney Roosters.
Croft has a contract with the Storm for the next two years but Bellamy said he would consider letting him go if he was presented with an opportunity to play regular first-grade football elsewhere.
“It’s been a tough situation for Brodie as well. He played (22) games and then he was left out of the side – I understand where he was coming from too,” Bellamy said.
“At the end of the day you’ve got to put yourself in the other guy’s shoes.
“That would have been really hard for him to take. But to his credit, he’s continued to work really hard and helped the rest of the team.
“At the end of the day if he wants to travel further down that line, we’ll sit down and talk about it.”
Bellamy said he didn’t realise that Croft was meeting with a rival coach but accepted that it was part of the modern game.
“I knew he was going to Sydney, I didn’t know he was going to meet Anthony Seibold,” Bellamy said.
“At the end of the day it’s the way our game goes, I’m not quite sure they were looking for the attention they ended up getting, but they got it.”
Central to the club’s decision on Croft will be the performance of Hughes, who started the year at fullback but has been transformed into a halfback.
Asked if Hughes could be a long-term No.7, Bellamy said: “I think he could be a long-term anything.
“He’s a pretty smart footy player, Jahrome, so it’s just a matter of him being comfortable in a certain position.
“I think he could play anywhere in the back, he could make a go of dummy-half too, he’s a pretty smart footy player.”
