Football Agents - Working for Rangers Benefit?

[Super_Ally 0]

Football Agents - Working for Rangers Benefit?

 

An interesting article written by Pete:

 

With transfer fees mushrooming out of control and the need for clubs to cut staff to a minimum, the football agent has become an important part of the game. Clubs no longer have the cash to employ scores of scouts so they are using football agents more and more to do the scouting for them.

 

This has a positive side in that clubs no longer have to pay the agents wages but pay commission or bonuses for services rendered. Jean Alain Boumsong is probably the best known example to Rangers supporters of an agent vending his wares for Rangers to make a nice profit.

 

Douglas the Brazilian defender from FC Twente is another perfect example of an agent delivering an excellent service for both his client and the club. Douglas was an unknown player, playing in the lower leagues in Brazil. His agent contacted FC Twente and asked them to take Douglas on trial. He is now developing into one of the best defenders in Holland with an asking price of between five and ten million pounds.

 

Every positive has a negative side of course, and although agents should be authorized, in many lands there are some dubious people acting as agents and that means that some dark and shady deals can be made with the misuse of players and corruption in general being a serious possibility. Even some of England�s top managers and agents were accused of illegal tapping of players a few years ago.

 

A boom in the number of football agents and the need for clubs to find talent means agents are scouting for players at a far younger age as in the past. In Holland which is famous for its youth development this is a huge cause for concern. In the last few years, the number of youth players leaving the country before playing professional football in Holland, has snowballed from three percent to more than twenty percent.

 

Where a handful of scouts used to take in a Dutch professional youth league game as many as one hundred agents from all over Europe are now present on a weekly basis. Arsenal and Chelsea are two of the biggest players in the siphoning of young Dutch talent. Under the Dutch FA laws a youth player may not be contracted until he is sixteen but where there are rules there are ways of breaking them.

 

The rules also state that if the parents of a child emigrate then the child can walk away from the club without any consequences to the child or a new club. Top clubs are now finding or providing work for the parents while the child is entered into the football youth scheme to develop further. The attraction of their son playing for a big European club, and promises of a golden nugget, make parents pull their families away from a trusted environment to the uncertainty of life at a top club where probably ninety percent of kids won�t make the grade. No safety net is in place to catch any kids who don�t make the grade at a large club, they are simply told they are not wanted and shown the door. Many do make the grade at a lesser club but for some the emotional body blow is too much and they slip back into the ranks of amateur football.

 

As I have preached in the past, Rangers should have a small team of scouts who work from Ibrox and build up an association with top agents all over the world. That is the way forward in my eyes. We as a club cannot possibly pay a huge network of scouts to wander the world looking for a diamond. We have to be associated with the people who are already in place to spot that diamond. We also have to better our youth system so that agents and parents want to send their players/children to Rangers. The SFA also have to play a role in bringing coaching in Scotland up to scratch so as the SPL is attractive to foreign players.

 

In saying all that, there have to be international rules brought into place to stop the poaching of Children under sixteen. A young child should be brought up in his own environment and not be pulled away from friends and family at too young an age. The parents have to take most of the responsibility here and not get carried away with dollar signs. If their kids are good enough for the top they will reach the top anyway. A child should grow up and not be pushed up.

 

Whether clubs like it or not dealing with agents has become an important part in football. This situation should not only be for the good of the players and agents but also for the clubs. Rangers should utilize the contacts and knowledge these agents have for the benefit of the club as well. If agents want to earn money we should make them earn it.

[Big Spliff 0]

Good piece. I do agree with the model of key links to associates, it's a far cheaper and possibly just as effective way of scouting.

 

I would also like to see the setting up of soccer schools across the globe though. We don't have to buy building etc - we just need to rent places and pay people to coach kids.

 

The world of agents is still a mystery to me tbh. But it seems that they have control, which is the wrong way round, surely?