Dragons CEO Webb reveals how conversations about Hunt’s early departure started

The St George Illawarra Dragons have officially cut ties with Ben Hunt after both parties mutually agreed to end a partnership due to conclude at the end of 2025.

Hunt had already been given permission to speak to rival clubs early as many began to presume that the Maroons star had played his final game for the club.

With Hunt previously being denied of an early release, the Dragons were now the more eager party to get out of the deal and after weeks of speculation the 34-year-old is now a free agent.

Although the release is not surprising, the timely nature of the exit is a contentious point as Dragons CEO Ryan Webb opened up on how they came to the decision.

“It’s not a one-off thing where it just becomes a conversation, there’s lot of little pieces that over time, you have a bit of a conversation and you an see something doesn’t feel quite right,” Webb told SEN 1170 The Run Home.

“There’s another conversation where you say, ‘Yea, someone else has noticed it or someone has verbalised it’, that happened over a couple of months.

“I’d say just in the last few days, we sat there and thought, we could see there was a few comments publicly made (that) Ben put out there and that Shane put out there, I guess we could see from my point of view and a couple of others (thought) we need to bring this to a head now because it’s not going to work.

“You could see things were going to ultimately affect the other players and people around the club, it sort of builds up slowly, I guess it came to a head a few days ago and then you sit down and go, ‘Ok guys what are one or two ways we can bring this to a close’, and that’s how we came to (the decision) that we did.”

The Dragons have been linked to many available halfbacks but are seemingly favourites to land a former junior Tyran Wishart.

“It literally only happened this morning so we haven’t enquired (about players for 2025),” Webb added.

“There’s a lot of players that we’ve talked around 26’ already so those discussions are ongoing.

“He’s a great footballer and the romantic part of it to, bringing a Gerringong junior home.

“Wishart’s name has been brought up a lot but for 2025 most of these guys are signed.

“There’s discussions and plenty of talks have been had about the future beyond that but I’d be lying if I said that there was one lined ready to jump in straight to 25’ at this stage.”