Dodgy agents, dodgy deals, the sorry tale continues

[The Green Programme]

Lets be honest the only reason we as fans care about this is because it isn't working out for us on the pitch. If we were top of the Prem with all this shadiness going on, most of us wouldn't give a oxf*rd.

Exactly - the weird amorality that pervades all, whilst a Club is successful…

Just think of the Villa v Derby play off final; both clubs had ‘shot their bolt’ financially; the winners have reaped the rewards, whilst the losers just could not cope with the fallout, were allegedly dishonest in their attempts to avoid censure; and have paid a severe price….

Or have they?

The FFP goalposts appear to be moving again.

Things have always been this way; it’s just since the TV money arrived, the stakes got higher…

And the risk taking to get to the promised land have become riskier and it’s impacts more widespread; across our Clubs and across the world in respect of their owners.

[scumbag]

This forum is becoming more like one of those conspiracy theory sites……

Business is business…

Billionaires move in circles we know nothing about.

Media outlets produce nothing more than rumours and opinions usually created by marketing and PR departments of vested interests of one kind or another.

Pauno left with a classy message but had to go; he was given a lot of time to turn it round and failed.

If you want to look at dodgy goings on and rule bending; look at City and Chelsea… they’re excellent examples on how to do it successfully!!

Our owners have made mistakes; every owner we’ve ever had has made mistakes.

And hindsight (when in judgement rather than balanced feedback) is generally tiresome.

We now have an exciting interim manager appointed and owners that have resources which, I hope will be used more wisely going forward.

They have made a decision and acted. Let’s now be thankful.

Let’s look forward and get excited about the Birmingham game.

Hi Mr. Yongge

[The Green Programme]

This forum is becoming more like one of those conspiracy theory sites……

Business is business…

Billionaires move in circles we know nothing about.

Media outlets produce nothing more than rumours and opinions usually created by marketing and PR departments of vested interests of one kind or another.

Pauno left with a classy message but had to go; he was given a lot of time to turn it round and failed.

If you want to look at dodgy goings on and rule bending; look at City and Chelsea… they’re excellent examples on how to do it successfully!!

Our owners have made mistakes; every owner we’ve ever had has made mistakes.

And hindsight (when in judgement rather than balanced feedback) is generally tiresome.

We now have an exciting interim manager appointed and owners that have resources which, I hope will be used more wisely going forward.

They have made a decision and acted. Let’s now be thankful.

Let’s look forward and get excited about the Birmingham game.

Hi Mr. Yongge

I shall assume that you are a grown up and have developed some kind of intelligent means of communicating as opposed to responding to events like one of the paranoid characters from ‘A Scanner Darkly’.

Who would you like to have seen appointed?

And why?

Or are you just going to come out with the wonderful old Irish saying;

‘Well, if it was me, I just wouldn’t have started from here’

It’s amazing how so many people on this forum and elsewhere, who have no clue about how to run a football club seem to know what they would have done, and what should have been done and cannot understand why our owners didn’t see everything in advance like they can see it in hindsight….

Etc etc…

I have always liked Paul Ince and I am glad that we’ve appointed someone who has stature in the football world.

Come on Incey!

[leon]

This forum is becoming more like one of those conspiracy theory sites……

Business is business…

Billionaires move in circles we know nothing about.

Media outlets produce nothing more than rumours and opinions usually created by marketing and PR departments of vested interests of one kind or another.

Pauno left with a classy message but had to go; he was given a lot of time to turn it round and failed.

If you want to look at dodgy goings on and rule bending; look at City and Chelsea… they’re excellent examples on how to do it successfully!!

Our owners have made mistakes; every owner we’ve ever had has made mistakes.

And hindsight (when in judgement rather than balanced feedback) is generally tiresome.

We now have an exciting interim manager appointed and owners that have resources which, I hope will be used more wisely going forward.

They have made a decision and acted. Let’s now be thankful.

Let’s look forward and get excited about the Birmingham game.

You’re an idiot.

[Franconian Royal]

This forum is becoming more like one of those conspiracy theory sites……

Business is business…

Billionaires move in circles we know nothing about.

Media outlets produce nothing more than rumours and opinions usually created by marketing and PR departments of vested interests of one kind or another.

Pauno left with a classy message but had to go; he was given a lot of time to turn it round and failed.

If you want to look at dodgy goings on and rule bending; look at City and Chelsea… they’re excellent examples on how to do it successfully!!

Our owners have made mistakes; every owner we’ve ever had has made mistakes.

And hindsight (when in judgement rather than balanced feedback) is generally tiresome.

We now have an exciting interim manager appointed and owners that have resources which, I hope will be used more wisely going forward.

They have made a decision and acted. Let’s now be thankful.

Let’s look forward and get excited about the Birmingham game.

You’re an idiot.

Leon, lay off. You’re a half wit. If you have nothing productive to say, don’t say anything.
As for the message by TGP, I agree. Ince is a little before my time, but he’s respected by many people. Let’s get behind him. C’mon Urzzzzzz.

[elrey]

Just came across this article which makes for depressing reading if even parts of it are true

https://footballtyper.com/2022/02/19/it-doesnt-make-for-good-reading/

This came out a while ago that Reading had been used by a dodgy Russian for money laundering purposes. We're still suffering the impact of that.

[Millsy]

This forum is becoming more like one of those conspiracy theory sites……

Business is business…

Billionaires move in circles we know nothing about.

Media outlets produce nothing more than rumours and opinions usually created by marketing and PR departments of vested interests of one kind or another.

Pauno left with a classy message but had to go; he was given a lot of time to turn it round and failed.

If you want to look at dodgy goings on and rule bending; look at City and Chelsea… they’re excellent examples on how to do it successfully!!

Our owners have made mistakes; every owner we’ve ever had has made mistakes.

And hindsight (when in judgement rather than balanced feedback) is generally tiresome.

We now have an exciting interim manager appointed and owners that have resources which, I hope will be used more wisely going forward.

They have made a decision and acted. Let’s now be thankful.

Let’s look forward and get excited about the Birmingham game.

Ignore the usual braindead suspects mate. It's a footy forum so you're going to get that level of intellect and wit often. Learn to enjoy it.

As for your comments I'm not sure I agree about Ince being exciting. I'm excited that it's not Pauno but otherwise a bit hit and miss and I'm counting on it being an interim set-up. Not bad for that.

The rest of your post though yes it's a fair take on the situation and balances the negativity. No point going nuts about stuff I agree but it's useful to be mindful and cautious and make our feelings known to Dai. I think we've seen enough damage by Kia for example to want him to lay off, whether there's a conspiracy or not.

[Snowflake Royal]

Lets be honest the only reason we as fans care about this is because it isn't working out for us on the pitch. If we were top of the Prem with all this shadiness going on, most of us wouldn't give a oxf*rd.

Speak for yourself. Some of us aren't a moral vaccuum.

[Loafer]

Lets be honest the only reason we as fans care about this is because it isn't working out for us on the pitch. If we were top of the Prem with all this shadiness going on, most of us wouldn't give a oxf*rd.

Speak for yourself. Some of us aren't a moral vaccuum.

I am

[Lower West]

Lets be honest the only reason we as fans care about this is because it isn't working out for us on the pitch. If we were top of the Prem with all this shadiness going on, most of us wouldn't give a oxf*rd.

We wouldn't be watching Reading if that's what we wanted from being supporters of the club. Successfull clubs have their roots planted firmly in the community. Doesn't matter what division they play in. As long as there's value and entertainment from watching the team. Listen to 606 at weekends and it's a boring constant whinging session from supporters at the top.

[Hound]

Is a depressing if well researched read.

Didn't read it so much as money laundering (though maybe I missed those bits) and more a case of Kia getting his claws in and milking the club of agents cuts and fees regularly

For him, the club being successful is also massively beneficial - think of the money he'd make if he was getting in and out Prem players. He just isn't doing a very good job of it. Seems like Dai has incompetently put his trust in someone taking him for a ride and promising all sorts whist rinsing him of cash whilst doing so

[Lower West]

This forum is becoming more like one of those conspiracy theory sites……

Business is business…

Billionaires move in circles we know nothing about.

Media outlets produce nothing more than rumours and opinions usually created by marketing and PR departments of vested interests of one kind or another.

Pauno left with a classy message but had to go; he was given a lot of time to turn it round and failed.

If you want to look at dodgy goings on and rule bending; look at City and Chelsea… they’re excellent examples on how to do it successfully!!

Our owners have made mistakes; every owner we’ve ever had has made mistakes.

And hindsight (when in judgement rather than balanced feedback) is generally tiresome.

We now have an exciting interim manager appointed and owners that have resources which, I hope will be used more wisely going forward.

They have made a decision and acted. Let’s now be thankful.

Let’s look forward and get excited about the Birmingham game.

Hi Mr. Yongge

I shall assume that you are a grown up and have developed some kind of intelligent means of communicating as opposed to responding to events like one of the paranoid characters from ‘A Scanner Darkly’.

Who would you like to have seen appointed?

And why?

Or are you just going to come out with the wonderful old Irish saying;

‘Well, if it was me, I just wouldn’t have started from here’

It’s amazing how so many people on this forum and elsewhere, who have no clue about how to run a football club seem to know what they would have done, and what should have been done and cannot understand why our owners didn’t see everything in advance like they can see it in hindsight….

Etc etc…

I have always liked Paul Ince and I am glad that we’ve appointed someone who has stature in the football world.

Come on Incey!

The owners knew what they were doing, There was no never a long term plan. The Chinese are renowned for being gamblers. The owners wanted to do better than than their billionaire mates. The number of clubs owned by the Chinese peaked in 2017 and has steadily declined since. Not the game it once was.

[Gunny Fishcake]

What seems bizarre is that it's blatantly obvious that if an agent is handling signings, and gets a cut from the deals, he's going to have making the most money for himself as a priority, not getting value for the buying club, nor getting the right players for the squad.

Why would any owner think it's a good way to run a club?

Wolves in fairness to them have done it successfully and in fairness you can argue that Brentford have it done it via a similar route, not using a specific agent or agent company, but rather using a particular network in an area to be successful, in this case Scandinavia. It's probably regarded as the way that football is going now.

I don't necessarily think that agents won't be interested in the buying club's interests either personally. It would be like a business not caring about the quality of their products when it's a major concern as the club may stop using the agent altogether. But I agree where you say their primary interests in getting a cut from the deal as that's their livelihoods.

Wolves are arguably one of the most corrupt horrible clubs in the Premiership.....they have super agent Jorge Mendez being bankrolled by their corrupt Chinese owners and when the league table for fees paid to agents was published , Wolves were bottom even though they had paid millions on Portuguese players that Mendez has on his books

[Hound]

What seems bizarre is that it's blatantly obvious that if an agent is handling signings, and gets a cut from the deals, he's going to have making the most money for himself as a priority, not getting value for the buying club, nor getting the right players for the squad.

Why would any owner think it's a good way to run a club?

Wolves in fairness to them have done it successfully and in fairness you can argue that Brentford have it done it via a similar route, not using a specific agent or agent company, but rather using a particular network in an area to be successful, in this case Scandinavia. It's probably regarded as the way that football is going now.

I don't necessarily think that agents won't be interested in the buying club's interests either personally. It would be like a business not caring about the quality of their products when it's a major concern as the club may stop using the agent altogether. But I agree where you say their primary interests in getting a cut from the deal as that's their livelihoods.

Wolves are arguably one of the most corrupt horrible clubs in the Premiership.....they have super agent Jorge Mendez being bankrolled by their corrupt Chinese owners and when the league table for fees paid to agents was published , Wolves were bottom even though they had paid millions on Portuguese players that Mendez has on his books

Also mentioned before but if they hadn't gone up when they did, they'd have blown FFP out of the water. Miles over it.

[Sutekh]

You know they can't just pick and choose right?

It's a private business.

All it does is check they have the money required (he does), and doesn’t have any dodgy financial convictions (he doesn’t).

It's not set up to whittle out incompetents and asset strippers.

Maybe that is the problem though and maybe that's why so many clubs run into financial issues in every division as well.

They allowed Steve Dale to buy Bury FC for a £1, he must have had the funds, but then they go out of business and are now playing against my local side in the very bottom tier of the footballing pyramid.

iirc - it's not just about the buying funds, but the funds to run a club, like Zingarvich only passed because Daddy guaranteed him.

The key isn't the test, its regulation and transparency of finances, transfers and player agents to make clubs unattractive to these people. And getting football finances in order so you can run a club viably on income, not needing all these dodgy deals and mega rich owners.

Think the proposed Hull deal was a whole lot different to the eventual Reading deal, weren't there other people involved and the general structure was different.

One would hope the criteria used by the FA/FL/PL for parties wanting to buy clubs is exactly the same but somehow it wouldn't be surprise if it was all completely different and therefore a prime example why you shouldn't have two separate organisations running what is effectively the same competition.

[YorkshireRoyal99]

Wolves in fairness to them have done it successfully and in fairness you can argue that Brentford have it done it via a similar route, not using a specific agent or agent company, but rather using a particular network in an area to be successful, in this case Scandinavia. It's probably regarded as the way that football is going now.

I don't necessarily think that agents won't be interested in the buying club's interests either personally. It would be like a business not caring about the quality of their products when it's a major concern as the club may stop using the agent altogether. But I agree where you say their primary interests in getting a cut from the deal as that's their livelihoods.

Wolves are arguably one of the most corrupt horrible clubs in the Premiership.....they have super agent Jorge Mendez being bankrolled by their corrupt Chinese owners and when the league table for fees paid to agents was published , Wolves were bottom even though they had paid millions on Portuguese players that Mendez has on his books

Also mentioned before but if they hadn't gone up when they did, they'd have blown FFP out of the water. Miles over it.

Whether Wolves are hiding what they pay to agents or not, that's something we can't prove sat here, but I wouldn't be surprised. They went through their agent successfully as they've managed to get to the PL and have been established for a few years now and are pushing Europe as well again.

They would have blown FFP out of the water though which annoys me because it's as if Wolves and Villa are these excellently run clubs in the PL these days yet they basically cheated their way through the Championship and yet ourselves and Sheffield Wednesday are those who should never be followed despite doing similar but yet failing.

[RoyalBlue]

Lets be honest the only reason we as fans care about this is because it isn't working out for us on the pitch. If we were top of the Prem with all this shadiness going on, most of us wouldn't give a oxf*rd.

True to an extent. But supporters would still be very rightly concerned about any potential FFP transgressions, regardless of how well the team were doing.

[leon]

This forum is becoming more like one of those conspiracy theory sites……

Business is business…

Billionaires move in circles we know nothing about.

Media outlets produce nothing more than rumours and opinions usually created by marketing and PR departments of vested interests of one kind or another.

Pauno left with a classy message but had to go; he was given a lot of time to turn it round and failed.

If you want to look at dodgy goings on and rule bending; look at City and Chelsea… they’re excellent examples on how to do it successfully!!

Our owners have made mistakes; every owner we’ve ever had has made mistakes.

And hindsight (when in judgement rather than balanced feedback) is generally tiresome.

We now have an exciting interim manager appointed and owners that have resources which, I hope will be used more wisely going forward.

They have made a decision and acted. Let’s now be thankful.

Let’s look forward and get excited about the Birmingham game.

You’re an idiot.

Leon, lay off. You’re a half wit. If you have nothing productive to say, don’t say anything.
As for the message by TGP, I agree. Ince is a little before my time, but he’s respected by many people. Let’s get behind him. C’mon Urzzzzzz.

And you are?

I'm not the one trying to brush all this shit under the carpet. "Business is business"

[Dirk Gently]

Not sure how this can be dismissed as ""Business is business".

To me it's quite simple. If the owners purchased the club to acheive make money or obtain prestige through the team's success on the pitchthen good luck to them, but if their prime motivation is using the club as a vehicle to make money through dodgy deals or money laundering, and what happens on the pitch is irrelevant to that aim - then tha's abhorrent and negates the whole purpose of the football club.

I'm aware that the underlying problems are twofold - company law allows a football club to be bought or sold as if it was any other kind of business; and the EFL, for all their good intentions, don't have the staff, resources or money to allow them to do a proper job of governing the clubs under their jurisdiction.

But it's unfortunately so very depressing and so very predicatable and makes me fear for the long-term existence of this football club.

[YorkshireRoyal99]

Yeah it's certainly not what I'd describe as "business to business", there are absolutely no moral justifications to these dodgy dealings at all.

It genuinely makes me wonder though how we pass any audits on our business practices though, particularly if the deals are dodgy as well.