Boxing promoter Eddie Hearn has told Northampton Saints that Henry Pollock "cannot stay" on his current £150,000 salary — and that the 21-year-old back-row forward is now worth around £1million a year.

Hearn, who signed Pollock to his Matchroom Talent Agency in March, told the Daily Telegraph's Gavin Mairs that Pollock is "certainly a seven-figure player" and suggested that annual earnings of roughly £1m represent the going rate for a young talent who has already made his England debut and toured with the British and Irish Lions (BBC Sport).

The gap between those two figures is stark. Pollock's current Northampton deal, signed in December 2024 and due to expire in summer 2027, is thought to be worth about £150,000 a year. Since putting pen to paper, his stock has soared: an England debut, a Lions tour call-up, and now representation by one of the most high-profile promoters in British sport (BBC Sport; ESPN).

For context, the average Premiership back-row forward earns a mean of £192,000, while players with between 11 and 20 Test caps earn around £224,000. Bath fly-half Finn Russell — another Hearn client — is believed to be the Premiership's highest earner on roughly £1m a year (BBC Sport).

Hearn's intervention puts Northampton in a bind. The Gallagher Premiership operates a league-wide salary cap of £6.4m, though each club is allowed one "marquee player" whose wages are exempt from that ceiling. The salary cap report for the 2024-25 season showed Northampton did not spend up to the £6.4m limit, with Bath, Leicester, Sale, Harlequins and Saracens all outlaying more (BBC Sport).

There is also recent precedent at Franklin's Gardens that will worry Saints supporters. Last season the club failed to reach agreement with captain George Furbank on a new deal, allowing him to leave for Harlequins (BBC Sport).

Northampton boss Phil Dowson, for his part, has been relaxed about the Hearn partnership. He said in April that Pollock would go to "another level" under Hearn's guidance and admitted he was not shocked by the groundbreaking agency deal (Planet Rugby).

What makes this unusual is the agent doing the talking. Hearn is best known for promoting world-title fights involving the likes of Anthony Joshua, not for negotiating rugby contracts. His involvement signals how quickly Pollock's profile has risen — and how much leverage a player can carry when an England shirt and a Lions tour are already on the résumé at 21.

Whether Northampton can — or will — stretch to seven figures for a player still two years from the end of his contract is the question now hanging over the club. Hearn has made the scale of the ask public. The response from Saints has not yet come.