Football agents

Football agents have become the most powerful figures in football, and for all the wrong reasons. They are tapping up young talented players, promising them a lot of money and in the end the players become nothing more than their slaves. Most of the agents are corrupted and are not working in the best interest of the player they are representing. They are taking money from the clubs in order to finalize transfer deals and usually own a certain percentage of a player, which allows them to take the money from the transfer fees paid for the player. Instead of working in the best interest of their clients, the agents are encouraging player to take as much money as possible from the clubs, as they are entitled to a percentage of player’s wages. There have been a lot of cases where agents promised youngsters, especially from Africa, that they will take them to big European clubs and instead just took the money from their families and left them hanging.

The list of all licensed agents can be found at FIFA website. Not all agents are corrupted but the some of them certainly are. It seems that English Premier League has been the breeding ground in Europe and you probably remember Lord Stevens’ enquire into bung allegations surrounding Premier League transfers. However, the investigation was finished but nothing happened after that. All these allegations are very difficult to prove and that is the main reason why the agents are still able to do whatever they want. Some of you are probably familiar with the term tapping up, and that is when an agent offers his player to another club without being given the consent of the club the player has contract with. This happened when Jose Mourinho tried to bring Ashley Cole to Chelsea and both of them were found guilty of the tapping charges, while player’s agent saw his license suspended for nine months. Chelsea and Ashley Cole received small fines, and the player ended up at Stamford Bridge after all.

World governing bodies are trying to find a way to deal with this plague but all the attempts to prove some wrongdoing have been in vain and at least for now there is no solution to this problem. This is something that simply needs to be eradicated and one of the steps is to bring in more young people, who want to do the job the right way and help the players fulfill their dreams. This is something that football agent is supposed to be all about and Sports Management Graduate Programs are set up to help all football fans to learn the basis of sports management and eventually do the job they like.

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