Monday 21 October 2019 16:26, UK
Leeds have been fined £20,000 - with half of it suspended - after admitting they had breached Super League's salary cap.
The RFL says the club were charged following the audit of the 2018 salary cap, where Leeds had failed to declare payments to three players.
The total amount of the breach was £55,000, with the club found to have exceeded the salary cap at four separate points during the season by sums ranging from £10,500 to £25,500.
Leeds accepted the RFL's decision, removing the need for an independent tribunal.
Leeds Rhinos CEO Gary Hetherington said: "This was an administrative error on our part for which I take responsibility and we are obviously disappointed to lose our 23-year unblemished salary cap compliance record.
"We had no idea we had exceeded the 'live' cap at the time and with hindsight we could have averted the breach by loaning out a player to another club.
"Two of the players, Jack Walker and Luke Briscoe, were promoted from part-time to full-time status during the season and whilst their increased monthly payments were included in our salary cap return to the RFL, we didn't lodge their new contracts until the end of the season.
"Matt Parcell also had his contract extended at the start of the season and whilst the increased monthly payments were paid the contract wasn't signed and lodged with the RFL until the end of the season and those combined breaches created the breach we now accept.
"Managing a Super League club salary cap is, and has always been, a very precise operation and we have now revised some of our internal procedures to ensure we don't make the same mistake again."
This is the second time a Super League club have been fined this year after Wigan were ordered to pay £7,000 for breaches during the 2017 season in March.
The 2018 Super League champions were originally docked two points and a £5,000 fine two months earlier after an independent tribunal found them guilty of breaches in relation to six separate payments, totalling £4,700.
The Warriors took their case to arbitration service Sport Resolutions, where the two-point deduction was upheld but suspended for 12 months and they had to pay a fine of £5,000 and costs of £2,000 for the original hearing.
