Cronulla's Will Kennedy drops hint on NRL future

Will Kennedy is keen to remain at Cronulla beyond this season as the NRL club eyes the end of a tight salary-cap squeeze.

The softly spoken Sharks fullback showed his boisterous side at the NRL's fan event before the clash with Penrith in Las Vegas, busting out some impressive hip-hop dance moves on stage at a packed Fremont Street.

"I'm a bit of a shy guy but Tricky (Braydon Trindall) called me out so I thought I'd have a dance," Kennedy told AAP.

"It's all good fun."

On the field, Kennedy is more of a quiet achiever than his dance moves would suggest, rarely mentioned alongside James Tedesco or Dylan Edwards in conversations about the NRL's best fullbacks.

But he has become one of the Sharks' most valued players for his work rate and dependability across 107 first-grade games.

Kennedy and prop Tom Hazelton are the Sharks' last two week-in, week-out first graders without contract beyond this season after the club re-signed Braydon Trindall, Briton Nikora, Oregon Kaufusi, Cam McInnes, Teig Wilton and Ronaldo Mulitalo before round one.

Talented but inexperienced utility Daniel Atkinson, who was offered exorbitant money by St George Illawarra, is the only man to have slipped through the cracks for 2026.

With the Sharks' salary-cap squeeze naturally becoming tighter as more players are re-signed, Kennedy is hopeful there is still room for him.

The club scouted him after he moved from Bathurst to Sydney as a teenager and handed him an NRL debut in 2019.

"I grew up here as a youngster," Kennedy said.

"I definitely want to stay and enjoy my time at the Sharks. I love the Sharks."

AAP understands the Sharks are keen to keep Kennedy, but a deal is far from being done.

The Sharks are wary of being priced out after Atkinson signed at the Dragons, and also have a handy replacement if Kennedy is lured elsewhere by bigger money.

Cronulla re-signed Kennedy's understudy Lison Ison as part of their off-season spending spree and rate the Penrith junior highly.

Sharks head coach Craig Fitzgibbon can smile now when he looks back on his first year at Cronulla.

"The first year, any criticism we had was that I needed to change the team. We've kept the same team and now all of a sudden we're fighting to keep them," said Fitzgibbon.

"We're just growing up.

"A lot of guys are starting to hit the sweet spot. We've got a lot of maturity now."

Fitzgibbon expects Nicho Hynes to take on more of a role running the ball this season as the star halfback looks to perfect his chemistry with five-eighth Trindall.

The pair played together in only 14 of the Sharks' 27 games last year and the off-season has been rife with questions as to which of the two will run the attack this year.

Hynes, who spent time at fullback earlier in his career, is a natural ball-runner.

"If he can get the balance of when to run and how hard he runs, I think that makes him more dangerous," Fitzgibbon said.

"It adds another layer of danger to the attacking system."