James Tedesco, Mitchell Moses, Luke Brooks and captain Aaron Woods are unsigned for 2018 with the club facing an uphill battle to retain all four marquee men.

So Taylor jumped on the front foot and told the media he would not be answering questions about the issue.

“It was bizarre yesterday that coach Jason Taylor addressed the media off-camera and said ‘look, we’re not going to be answering any questions about contracts all year. You can ask the but you’re not going to get an answer because we don’t want this to become an issue’,” Danny Weidler told the Triple M Grill Team.

“I get that he doesn’t want us to be asking about it, but I think that every single journo was looking sideways and saying ‘that’s the topic’. It’s the topic and you can’t avoid it.

 
“You can’t control the media. And Jason Taylor’s a smart bloke and he knows that so I don’t know why he bothered with that speech to us. But, it was interesting in a way last year how he handled the Robbie Farah thing and he really got on the front foot and took Farah on and a lot of people say he won that war. So maybe he figures he can get on the front foot again dictate the media but he should know better.”   

 

All four players are managed by Isaac Moses, giving him unprecedented power at the negotiating table.

“Perhaps the most interesting thing is that they all share the same manager Isaac Moses," Weidler said. "He basically controls the Wests Tigers fate this year and beyond because he can play one against the other he can play his players against each other. They are almost a mini cartel.

“This is going to be an ongoing story for the Tigers for the year.”