Former Gold Coast Titans official Scott Sattler believes the club was right in signing enigmatic star Jarryd Hayne but made the mistake of offering the former Dally M winner an option in his favour as part of contract negotiations.

Sattler has told NRL.com that giving the fullback an option to stay in his second season was a massive blunder.

“From a business point of view it looked like a really good decision. And if put in the same situation I probably would have looked at it and thought that this could give the club a really positive story,” Sattler said.

“Twelve months ago it was a great idea. I’ll have to admit that I bought into it as well and thought it would be really good because from a Gold Coast promotional point of view it would have been a really smart investment.

“But to do your due diligence you speak to the right people who are going to give you a frank and brutal assessment and then you decide whether it’s actually going to be the right decision.

Let the circus begin. @GCTitans CEO arrives at club ahead of crisis meeting over coach Neil Henry and star @JarrydHayne @abcgoldcoast pic.twitter.com/ETFBxT5g9C

— Tom Forbes (@tomforbesGC) August 13, 2017

“I know Graham Annesley has said that they did their due diligence and there were comfortable with where they sat but I don’t think they probably did the correct due diligence. They might have done due diligence and got the answers that they wanted to hear.

“It was the right business decision to sign him, it was the wrong negotiation tool to say that the second year was going to be his option.

“By June 30 [this year] if I was the recruitment manager I would have known that I wasn’t going to renew that contract, because I would have been with him day in and day out and I would have seen the effect he was having on training ethics and those sorts of things.”

It is now expected that Coach Neil Henry will be let go with Hayne next in the firing line.