Northampton make Henry Pollock stance clear after stunning £1m claim

The young back-rower is represented by Hearn's Matchroom Talent Agency, which also counts Bath and Scotland fly-half Finn Russell among its rugby clients, alongside high-profile athletes from other sports, including UFC heavyweight Tom Aspinall.

Speaking to The Telegraph at the start of August, Hearn argued that Northampton can no longer place the same value on Pollock as they would an ordinary young player.

With strict salary restrictions in place across PREM Rugby, a contract worth £1 million would likely require Pollock to occupy a marquee player position, with one such spot at Saints already taken by England fly-half Fin Smith.

Following Northampton's PREM Rugby victory over Saracens at Allianz Stadium several months ago, Dowson addressed the growing speculation surrounding Pollock and Hearn, insisting the attention is ultimately positive for the sport.

"I think it's very helpful. Eddie Hearn has a job to do and that's to promote his clients and to ask for more money for his clients and he's done both of those very effectively.

"Having eyeballs on the sport, we've said we want to publicise the game, grow the game and get more people in it, and he has the ability to do that across lots of different platforms.

"Eddie Hearn's great for the game, we want to keep Henry Pollock, fundamentally nothing has changed."

Asked whether he genuinely believes Pollock is worth a £1 million contract, Dowson said Hearn is entitled to put whatever valuation he wants on his client, although the figure could prove difficult to accommodate within the current salary structure.

"He can pick a number. It wouldn't necessarily be in my head. What he says is based on his job, my job is to fit 57/58 players within a budget."

Dowson also provided a positive update on negotiations, highlighting Hearn's comments about Pollock's ambitions beyond simply securing the biggest possible contract.

"It's going well. We're still pushing it through and what Eddie Hearn also said, was that Henry wants to win stuff, Henry wants to stay at Northampton, Henry wants to play with that group of players, Henry's enjoying himself and understands that we can talk about it but we've got to perform.

"He wants to win the World Cup, he wants to do all these things, I embrace that and I'm all for that. The appetite is for him to stay, and we've got to find a happy medium.

"We really want to keep him, he really wants to stay and that's a great starting point."