Canberra Raiders recruitment boss Peter Mulholland thinks the salary cap saga is a storm in a teacup and says the Green Machine will be unaffected even if the cap comes in lower than expected.
The Raiders have re-signed most of their top-25 players until at least the end of the 2018 season.
Reports suggested the NRL's initial ambit figure of $8.3 million for the salary cap for next year is well below what many clubs have counted on.
It raised fears clubs would have to jettison players when a final figure was agreed upon as they desperately tried to get under the cap.
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There was even one report on Sunday there might not be a cap for the 2018 season because clubs wouldn't be able to offload players because the no other club could take them.
But Mulholland was unconcerned by it all and said the Raiders had no problems.
It's a reassuring statement for Green Machine fans concerned whether they'd be able to keep their stars together after coach Ricky Stuart and Mulholland had assembled a strong list that was a genuine premiership contender.
With a majority of the squad locked up, Mulholland said he'd work on bolstering the depth of the squad.
"I think both sides have put in ambit claims at the moment. It will be somewhere in the middle and most clubs have been instructed to work towards that," he told Fairfax Media.
"At the end of the day it's a bit of a storm in a teacup ... I think it's a long way to go before anything's settled.
"We seem to be pretty right with it, on the basis of the minimum. My concern now is to build our depth, which won't have any impingement on it because we've got our top 20-21 players signed.
"We've got good concessions with our long-serving players ... [chief executive Don Furner]'s pretty across it I think."
With Raiders second-rower Elliott Whitehead suspended for tripping, recruit Dave Taylor came onto the bench for the Parramatta game - just his second in lime green since joining the club over the off-season.
Whitehead will return to the second-row for Saturday's game against the Gold Coast Titans in Queensland, which could see Taylor drop out of the 17.
But so far the "Coal Train" has impressed Stuart with his work ethic and Mulholland said the Raiders coach would make a decision before the end of May whether they'd take up the one-year option to keep Taylor for 2018 as well.
"Rick will make a decision at the end of May about Dave Taylor, because he's got an option that he can take up ... by the end of May," Mulholland said.
At the start of the season, Mulholland said he'd scour the market in search of a utility back to help cover the loss of winger Edrick Lee to the Cronulla Sharks due to salary cap pressure.
But he wasn't sure whether they still needed one.
He said the success of Nick Cotric, who debuted on the wing in round one and has played every game so far this season, meant they already had their utility back.
Cotric scored the match-winning try against the Eels on Saturday.
While the 18-year-old has been playing as a winger, his preferred position is either fullback or centre.
Mulholland said they could now return to trying to lure a winger for depth or simply concentrate on developing the players already within their ranks.
"I think our utility back is probably Nick Cotric. Bearing in mind he'd hardly played on the wing - he's a fullback-centre - so it may be that we just look for a winger," he said.
"We've got Kato Ottio to come back [from a knee reconstruction]. There's a couple of options there so I'm not going to hunt too far and wide ... I think we'll just look from within."
NRL ROUND SIX
Saturday: Canberra Raiders v Gold Coast Titans at the Gold Coast, 5.30pm. Live on Fox League.