Payten says Cowboys owe Green ‘great debt of gratitude’, Dragons to splash cash for Hunt

Cowboys coach Todd Payten said his players were dealing with the tragic news about Paul Green “in their own ways” and they are determined to honour their premiership-winning mentor by performing well as possible under the circumstances against the Roosters at the SCG.

Payten held his captain’s run media conference in Townsville on Friday morning before the second-placed team flew south for the crucial clash with the Roosters, coincidentally the club where Green served as an assistant coach before joining North Queensland in 2014 and guiding them to the premiership the following season.

Following Green’s sudden death on Thursday morning, club chairman Lewis Ramsay said he would be forever remembered “as one of the greatest contributors in Cowboys history”.

“There’s a fair motivation about what’s ahead of us this weekend and who we’re playing and what we’re doing,” Payten said. “It’s been a difficult 24 hours and as a club and as a group we just have to put our arms around each other and keep an eye out for any signs.

“At the end of the day I guess it’s a good reminder of how fortunate we are to do what we do and we’d like to perform well in Paul’s honour.

“They’ve all been a little bit different in their own ways. Some guys have got a long history with Paul. I reached out to those guys yesterday and had a chat.

“We understand that grief affects people differently at dfferent times and the club has been great in making sure resources around staff and players to make sure that they can come up with strategies to best deal with that and talk through how they’re feeling.”

Payten said he personally owed Green a great debt of gratitude for employing him as an assistant coach in the 2015 when they won the competition, serving under him until the end of 2018.

“Myself and my family owe him a great deal of attitude,” Payten said. “He gave me an opportunity to come up here when I didn’t have a job, and that was his decision. He made me a better coach in many different ways, he certainly challenged everyone around him to be better and he was good company.

The coach said veteran prop Jordan McLean has been cleared to make his return from a hamstring injury via the interchange bench and that no players had requested missing the match due to the Green tragedy.

Dragons set to splash cash for Hunt

St George Illawarra look set to re-sign captain Ben Hunt beyond the end of his multimillion-dollar contract next year by tabling a contract extension.

The club and Hunt have held preliminary discussions and News Corp has reported the joint-venture board has given CEO Ryan Webb the go-ahead to offer a big-dollar deal for 2024 and 2025.

Hunt has been in career-best form and is one of the favourites for the Dally M Medal despite his team’s average season.

The Dragons are 11th heading into Sunday’s road game against Canberra and need to win all four of their remaining matches to have any chance of squeezing into the playoffs.

Young playmaker Jayden Sullivan, who is under contract for four more seasons, could seek a release if Hunt agrees to terms at the Dragons with Canterbury the frontrunner for his services if he leaves Wollongong.