Clubs have disclosed how much they paid to Agents in the period 1st October 2010 and 30th September 2011. Given a reasonable amount of activity in that period, including of course Ruiz, FFC seem to have done pretty well - just over £980k in total. Something like 5% of the transfer fees. The full list is - Club-by-club spending on agents' fees between October 1 2010 and September 30 2011: Man City £9.7m; Tottenham £7.6m; Liverpool £7m; Chelsea £6.5m; Newcastle £6.3m; Arsenal £4.6m; Man Utd £4.5m; Blackburn £4.2m; Sunderland £3.7m; Aston Villa £3.2m; Everton £2.9m; QPR £2.5m; Stoke £2.2m; Bolton £1.9m; West Brom £1.3m; Wolves £1.1m, Fulham £0.9m; Norwich £0.7m; Wigan £0.66m; Swansea £0.24m. Total: £71.9m.
I've never been a fan of Advisors or Agents, I don't think they do enough for the money they get paid. Most are money orientated, to the point of unsettling players who are happy to stay at clubs. Personally I think the clubs should make players agents take the responsibility for looking after all the players outside problems, like plumbing and Housing etc. Make the agents work for their living. I still remember an article in Fultime about the person employed by the club to sort out players problems. One I can remember was Steed phoned him up to say he was lost on London's Underground so he had to find him and take him home. Another was taking a players Parrot to the vets. Setting up repairs, deliveries, driving licenses, lost passports. Talk about pampered and isolated from the real world by the club. You start to wonder if the talk about free mobile phones to call their mistresses is true.
That is vey interesting. It may be indicative/explanatory of our difficulties in recruiting some of our "top targets" - not prepared to pay excessive agent fees. That would fit with MAF's ambition about a self-sustaining business model. May also be a compliment to Ali Mac as an astute negotiator.
