In a grand dinner at the Hilton on Park Lane last month to launch the League Managers Association 1,000 Club, Harry Redknapp issued an outspoken attack on “idiotic” agents.
Unfortunately the message has not got through to Redknapp’s chairman at Tottenham Hotspur, Daniel Levy. In the Premier League’s list of agent fees published yesterday, Tottenham appeared in fourth place, having spent £6,066,935 in the 12 months to September 30, 2009 as the result of the recruitment drive Redknapp has spearheaded since January, which illustrates the level of hypocrisy surrounding the use of football’s wheeler-dealers.
Agents are the new referees — a source of annoyance, frustration and certainly an easy target. Of course the majority of them are far more handsomely rewarded than officials — grotesquely so, in some cases — but they would not be paid at all if they were not providing some sort of service.
Sir Alex Ferguson also used his platform to condemn the sharp practices of agents, although the Manchester United manager was on more certain ground as one of the most fascinating aspects of the Premier League’s list is the relative pittance spent by his club.
United managed to retain the Premier League and reach a second successive Champions League final while paying only £1,517,393 to middlemen — little more than 10 per cent of the sum spent by their rather less successful rivals Manchester City, whose lavish signings included Carlos T?vez.
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With a large squad already at Ferguson’s disposal, United were not particularly active in the transfer market during the relevant period, with Michael Owen, Antonio Valencia and Gabriel Obertan their only new signings, but the small sum is still surprising.
United were after all involved in the world record transfer last summer, but did not pay a single penny of the £80 million received from Real Madrid for Cristiano Ronaldo to facilitate the deal, with the Spanish club coughing up £12.5 million to his agent, Jorge Mendes, a record in itself. United are also helped by the fact that Ferguson’s antipathy towards agents has filtered down through the club, with Gary Neville, Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes all representing themselves in contract negotiations, which over the years must have saved them a fortune.
Even renegotiating contracts with existing players can be an expensive business, as is shown by Chelsea being second in the table after a year in which they paid only one transfer fee, for Yuri Zhirkov. The bulk of their £9,562,223 fees were paid to keep their existing squad together, with Didier Drogba, John Terry, John Obi Mikel and several others signing new deals in precisely the kind of practice that so outrages Ferguson. As they all wanted to stay at Stamford Bridge agents can rarely have earned easier money, but in Chelsea’s defence it would have been far more expensive to replace even one of them.
Chelsea are one of several clubs who regularly pay agents to offload players, which explains several other anomalies. For West Ham United to part with £5,527,548 on agent fees seems odd given their perilous financial state, although if it saves them wages in the long run they will consider it money well spent. Agent fees are also generally higher in free transfers, which may be why Wigan Athletic spent £3,576,972.
Many fans will be outraged at the sums involved, but such anger can be productively channelled into driving fees down, as the experience of Football League clubs has demonstrated.
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With that in mind there is one obvious omission — Newcastle United — who if the Kevin Keegan tribunal is any guide are likely to face more opprobrium from their fans when the Football League figures are published this month. The agent fees league table is one competition they are guaranteed to win.