SYDNEY: Melbourne Storm coach Craig Bellamy's job with the New South Wales State of Origin rugby league side is safe - for now.
NSWRL boss Geoff Carr has backed Bellamy to lead the Blues in a third straight series so long as further revelations about the Storm's National Rugby Leaguesalary cap rort do not implicate the coach.
"As far as the NSWRL is concerned, Craig Bellamy is the coach unless something that we can't anticipate happens," Carr said yesterday. "On the evidence that we have, we can only assume that he knew nothing about it so we want to make sure that preparations continue.
"Obviously if there are further revelations we might have to re-think but at this stage we're certainly standing behind Craig."
Bellamy led NSW to 2-1 series defeats to Queensland in 2008 and 2009.
Carr, a former St George chief executive, said he believed it unlikely Bellamy would have been aware of the Storm's A$1.7 million ($2.2 million) cap breach over the past five years, which resulted in the club being stripped of two premierships and three minor premierships on Thursday.
As many as five Storm players flattened by the scandal - Cameron Smith, Greg Inglis, Billy Slater and Copper Cronk for Queensland and Brett White for NSW - will have to keep themselves up mentally to earn selection for the first Origin game in Sydney on May 26.
"It's very difficult unless you know the whole quantum, the details of the 25 players, to know whether your club's breaching the salary cap," Carr said.
"I've run a club before ... and I would be really, really surprised if Craig was across all the detail of all the salaries.
"I would say fairly comfortably that he wouldn't have been so, unless you're across everything, you wouldn't know.
"I've spoken to John Fordham, his manager, last night who said Craig was shattered but certainly was of the opinion that he just was oblivious to it all."
