Leeds Rhinos sporting director Ian Blease has told Sky Sports he is “6.5/10 Brad Arthur will stay”, with conversations to secure the Australian’s future ongoing. 

Speaking as the latest guest on The Bench rugby league podcast from Sky Sports, Blease was asked directly what the situation with Arthur was by Jon Wilkin and Jenna Brooks.

Arthur has two sons playing professional rugby league in the NRL and has never hidden the fact he plans to move back home to his family and coach in the league again.

“We work next door to each other and we see each other every day and we’ve been open and honest with each other from day one, still to this day,” Blease said.

“I know where he’s at and you’re right, he has shared his thoughts about going back to Australia. Will that happen? I don’t know.

“Is he keen to stay here? Yes, probably. Does it change week in, week out? There’s a bit of that because, obviously, the Perth job was there. That’s not there now.

“He probably still would take an NRL job at some point. My job is to convince him to stay here. The players are convincing him bit by bit, I think.

“He will have a decision to make. We all will pretty soon. Deadline-wise, he said two weeks to you guys [Sky Sports].

“I think it will be within the next month or so. We need me and him to have a professional, honest, open conversation about: ‘What’s it looking like?’ Because I’m looking at 2027 now. I always involve the head coach in that.

“I would suggest it would be one year with an option, hopefully, if we could convince him of that. This club needs certainty.”

Asked what would tempt Arthur to remain at Leeds when he hasn’t committed his future up to now, Arthur said:

“That temptation of winning something here, it is a big load for him, isn’t it? It’s got to be. And we’ve had that conversation: ‘Let’s do something, let’s win something together.’ Hopefully that grabs him.”

“I think when you’ve got a combination of a club working well together, and that’s not just him and me, that’s the whole group of staff we’ve got in the last 12 months or so, I think you’ve got to put some trust in those people to stay with you on the journey.

“And I’ve got that trust in him, but he will only do what’s right for Brad and his family. He will.

“So we’ve come to that agreement that we will decide very soon which way we go. He’ll go one way, we might go the other way. Internally, we will have that discussion.

“I’m 6.523 out of 10. Listen, he’s a great guy. I want to keep him. And I’ve said it on record, I want to keep him. We’re working together.

“Hopefully, we can get it over the line.”

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