St George Illawarra coach Anthony Griffin has all but ruled out making a play for Brandon Smith as the Melbourne hooker eyes a new NRL club in 2022.
Despite playing as a bench forward this season, the New Zealand international sees himself as a starting No.9 and won’t compete for a spot with good friend Harry Grant at the Storm should Cameron Smith retire.
On Monday Smith’s agent sent an email to 14 NRL clubs notifying them of his availability for 2022 – with a release from Melbourne conditional on getting a player of similar calibre in return.
It’s understood the email sparked interest from a number of NRL clubs willing to offer Smith a No.9 role, but the Dragons are not one of them.
With Cameron McInnes, Ben Hunt and Billy Brittain on the books as hooking options, Griffin said the club is unlikely to make a play for Smith although they have salary cap space to spend.
“It’s a nice story, everyone got an email because they’re covering their tracks by the sounds of it,” he told Big Sports Breakfast.
“We’ve got people like McInnes and Ben Hunt here and a couple young hookers in the system.
“(Recruiting Smith) is something we haven’t addressed.
“We do have some capacity left that we’re being patient with and over the off-season we’ll pick up a couple of more purchases but we certainly haven’t been down that path to look at Brandon.”
The Wests Tigers, Manly and Canterbury have been mentioned as likely destinations for the 24-year-old Smith.
Michael Maguire has spent time with Smith as coach of the Kiwis, while the Bulldogs and Sea Eagles could use a quality hooker to bolster their spine.
The only club that wasn’t included on the email list was Gold Coast, although they are likely to be interested in luring him to the club.