The Wests Tigers have ramped up their pursuit of Cameron Ciraldo, with the Panthers assistant understood to have toured the training facilities at Concord.
Both the Canterbury Bulldogs and Wests Tigers have expressed interest in Ciraldo, while the New Zealand Warriors - who are also on the lookout for a new coach - are yet to make their priority regarding who will be the next leader of the club known.
It's also unclear just how secure Justin Holbrook at the Gold Coast Titans or Adam O'Brien at the Newcastle Knights are, with both coaches only adding to their level of pressure over the weekend with their teams losing to the South Sydney Rabbitohs and Penrith Panthers respectively.
The prospect of a head coaching job for Ciraldo has been a long time coming, who has worked his way through Penrith's coaching ranks to become Ivan Cleary's key assistant.
According to Fox League, Ciraldo was met by the Tigers' top brass at Concord on Monday, namely football boss Tim Sheens and chairman Lee Hagipantelis.
It is understood that Sheens, Hagipantelis and club chief executive Justin Pascoe led a pitch to Ciraldo, who looks set as the Tigers' priority to replace the departed Michael Maguire.
Sheens has also spoken out over the need to have a "development coach", something Ciraldo will bring to the club in spades.
Having served as head coach during Penrith's clash with the Knights on Sunday with Ivan Cleary out of action due to medical reasons, he faced the press conference post game and said he was "flattered" by the interest.
โThis probably isnโt the forum to talk about what Iโm doing or what I want to do,โ he said.
โI know thereโs been a lot of speculation and itโs a credit to our club and our players that they donโt let that become a distraction โ I donโt think any of them have seen anything thatโs been written.
โObviously itโs been a little bit uncomfortable seeing your name in there all the time, but itโs also very flattering.
โMy job at the moment is just keep doing the best I can for Penrith, hopefully keep improving on our defence and all that stuff will come in due time.โ
Ciraldo is likely to be challenged for the NRL's vacant three jobs by the likes of Shane Flanagan, Paul Green, Kristian Woolf and a host of other assistant coaches in Josh Hannay, John Morris, Dean Young, Ben Hornby and Jason Ryles.
It has been heavily reported that Ciraldo will only move for the right job, and speaking on Fox League, former great turned analyst Matty Johns questioned whether moving to either the Tigers or Bulldogs would be the right move.
โBut the two clubs that are really chasing him hard are the Bulldogs and the Tigers. They are almost in competition and it has come out the Tigers are looking to offer him five years on big money," Johns said.
โThe thing about it is, is it the right job? Because regardless of the money and the enticement of the contract, do you want to go into a situation where you are setting yourself up for failure?โ
