Robbo
Paul Walsh
The site that gave us Bale's contract and Martial's contract apparently sits on hundreds of gigabytes of confidential contracts and agreements. VDV deal is here, Falcao loan to Chelski, Özil's contract, and lots more: https://footballleaks2015.wordpress.com/
Interesting how they are uncovering illegal third party ownership, which in the case of Twente actually led to them being investigated and banned from European competitions. This could get very interesting.
Football Leaks fears retribution. Why? For trying to make game transparent
In a sport with secrecy at heart of its governance, it is no surprise website is making enemies
Football Leaks has hit the mainstream. The website, set up in September 2015 to “increase transparency in the game”, has enjoyed a series of coups over recent weeks, publishing the transfer agreement that brought Anthony Martial to Manchester United and the contract of Gareth Bale with Real Madrid.
The detail is intriguing. We now know that Bale was the most expensive transfer in history with a price tag of €100 million (and that Real didn’t want that number to become public for fear of upsetting Cristiano Ronaldo who had hitherto been the most expensive signing) and the astonishing performance-related bonuses that could take the transfer fee for Martial from £36 million to £61 million.
Who is behind the website, modelled on WikiLeaks? Nobody seems to know. It is reportedly based in Portugal and uses Russian computer servers. Their most high-profile success before the Bale revelations was the publication of documents relating to illegal third-party influence exercised by the agency Doyen Sports over Twente. A subsequent investigation by the Dutch FA led to the club being banned from European competition for three years.
Little wonder that many powerful people are up in arms. Jonathan Barnett, the agent of Bale, said: “There should be an independent investigation because it’s outrageous. I think it is disgraceful that people can get hold of this stuff. It shows complete disregard for both clubs and the player.” Doyen accused the site of obtaining confidential documents through a “cyberattack”. Unnamed police sources in Portugal described the website as an “international criminal organisation” after allegations that it had tried to extort money to suppress documents.
Football Leaks emphatically rejects these claims, and has provided information to support its denials, but in an email exchange yesterday, it also acknowledged that it is now fearful of possible retribution. “We are not talking by phone or in person, we are making huge enemies in the game, so we need to be very careful . . . The Big Bosses in Turkey and Kazakhstan are really angry, and they want to silence us as fast as possible, so people can understand that we are taking huge risks.”
Whatever one’s view on Football Leaks and its methods, however, there can be no doubt that it is right to call for greater transparency. Agents and other assorted leeches find their niche in the subterfuge of the modern game. Fans have a right to know how much clubs are paying for players, how much is being siphoned off in brokerage fees and other activities that might sound alarm bells. This information should be brought out of the shadows and into the cold light of day.
We need to know about the “Scouting agreements” and “Intermediary agreements” that clubs, particularly on the continent, are using to get around the ban on third-party influence. We need to know about cases where agents get an automatic £1 million payment when a player gets transferred. We need to know about the subtle quid pro quos that exist in the small print and sub-clauses. Otherwise, how can clubs and agents be properly policed?
The problem, of course, is that secrecy in football starts at the very top. It is not only the clubs who lack openness, but also the governing bodies who are supposed to be policing them. A report by Transparency International, a campaigning organisation that fights corruption, examined all 209 FAs around the world, as well as the continental federations. It wanted to establish whether the minimum conditions for transparency were in place: do these organisations publish financial accounts? Do they report on their activities? Do they have statutes. Do they have codes of conduct?
The results were farcical. Even with such a low bar, football entirely flunked the test of modernity. It was found that 81 per cent of the 209 countries that receive funding from Fifa do not publish any accounts, including nations, such as Chile, Colombia and France, all ranked in the top 25 of the world. On the four criteria of openness measured, an astonishing 42 per cent of the member associations scored zero points — in other words, they don’t publish any relevant information whatsoever.
It is this dearth of transparency that has allowed corruption at the top of the game to fester, and explains so much of the chicanery and venality that afflicts club football. But it also hints at the structural problem facing the game: how can one expect the authorities to compel clubs to share information when they are themselves opaque? To put it a different way, when the guys at the top have something to hide, the last thing they will ever seek to do is create a culture of openness.
“All we want is transparency in the sport we all love,” Football Leaks told me yesterday. “The clubs have no respect for the fans, everything is a taboo; the player’s wages, transfer contracts, secret clauses, intermediates, etc. We are fighting for the sake of the sport, but we can’t change anything on our own. [We need a] new transfer system, a limited action for agents and investment funds, and a public database with all the transfer details and wages. If Fifa wants to give credibility back to football, they should really think about this.”
It is a cogent argument, and one that may finally be having an impact upon those at the top. Just last week, Mark Goddard, head of Fifa’s transfer matching system, said: “It would be really good if we could have a verifiable, transparent, credible source as opposed to just back pages, and the soccer leaks website. In the end, the market finds out this information but they do it in a very unofficial, unstructured way and that really allows a lot of the opacity and the wheeling and dealing to be done. That’s a real shame.”
But will Fifa make the necessary changes? Will it create the reforms that can bring openness to football? The sad truth is that it is only when Fifa is ready to be open and honest about its own inner workings that it will have the impetus and credibility to demand change from the wider game.
Interesting how they are uncovering illegal third party ownership, which in the case of Twente actually led to them being investigated and banned from European competitions. This could get very interesting.
Football Leaks fears retribution. Why? For trying to make game transparent
In a sport with secrecy at heart of its governance, it is no surprise website is making enemies
Football Leaks has hit the mainstream. The website, set up in September 2015 to “increase transparency in the game”, has enjoyed a series of coups over recent weeks, publishing the transfer agreement that brought Anthony Martial to Manchester United and the contract of Gareth Bale with Real Madrid.
The detail is intriguing. We now know that Bale was the most expensive transfer in history with a price tag of €100 million (and that Real didn’t want that number to become public for fear of upsetting Cristiano Ronaldo who had hitherto been the most expensive signing) and the astonishing performance-related bonuses that could take the transfer fee for Martial from £36 million to £61 million.
Who is behind the website, modelled on WikiLeaks? Nobody seems to know. It is reportedly based in Portugal and uses Russian computer servers. Their most high-profile success before the Bale revelations was the publication of documents relating to illegal third-party influence exercised by the agency Doyen Sports over Twente. A subsequent investigation by the Dutch FA led to the club being banned from European competition for three years.
Little wonder that many powerful people are up in arms. Jonathan Barnett, the agent of Bale, said: “There should be an independent investigation because it’s outrageous. I think it is disgraceful that people can get hold of this stuff. It shows complete disregard for both clubs and the player.” Doyen accused the site of obtaining confidential documents through a “cyberattack”. Unnamed police sources in Portugal described the website as an “international criminal organisation” after allegations that it had tried to extort money to suppress documents.
Football Leaks emphatically rejects these claims, and has provided information to support its denials, but in an email exchange yesterday, it also acknowledged that it is now fearful of possible retribution. “We are not talking by phone or in person, we are making huge enemies in the game, so we need to be very careful . . . The Big Bosses in Turkey and Kazakhstan are really angry, and they want to silence us as fast as possible, so people can understand that we are taking huge risks.”
Whatever one’s view on Football Leaks and its methods, however, there can be no doubt that it is right to call for greater transparency. Agents and other assorted leeches find their niche in the subterfuge of the modern game. Fans have a right to know how much clubs are paying for players, how much is being siphoned off in brokerage fees and other activities that might sound alarm bells. This information should be brought out of the shadows and into the cold light of day.
We need to know about the “Scouting agreements” and “Intermediary agreements” that clubs, particularly on the continent, are using to get around the ban on third-party influence. We need to know about cases where agents get an automatic £1 million payment when a player gets transferred. We need to know about the subtle quid pro quos that exist in the small print and sub-clauses. Otherwise, how can clubs and agents be properly policed?
The problem, of course, is that secrecy in football starts at the very top. It is not only the clubs who lack openness, but also the governing bodies who are supposed to be policing them. A report by Transparency International, a campaigning organisation that fights corruption, examined all 209 FAs around the world, as well as the continental federations. It wanted to establish whether the minimum conditions for transparency were in place: do these organisations publish financial accounts? Do they report on their activities? Do they have statutes. Do they have codes of conduct?
The results were farcical. Even with such a low bar, football entirely flunked the test of modernity. It was found that 81 per cent of the 209 countries that receive funding from Fifa do not publish any accounts, including nations, such as Chile, Colombia and France, all ranked in the top 25 of the world. On the four criteria of openness measured, an astonishing 42 per cent of the member associations scored zero points — in other words, they don’t publish any relevant information whatsoever.
It is this dearth of transparency that has allowed corruption at the top of the game to fester, and explains so much of the chicanery and venality that afflicts club football. But it also hints at the structural problem facing the game: how can one expect the authorities to compel clubs to share information when they are themselves opaque? To put it a different way, when the guys at the top have something to hide, the last thing they will ever seek to do is create a culture of openness.
“All we want is transparency in the sport we all love,” Football Leaks told me yesterday. “The clubs have no respect for the fans, everything is a taboo; the player’s wages, transfer contracts, secret clauses, intermediates, etc. We are fighting for the sake of the sport, but we can’t change anything on our own. [We need a] new transfer system, a limited action for agents and investment funds, and a public database with all the transfer details and wages. If Fifa wants to give credibility back to football, they should really think about this.”
It is a cogent argument, and one that may finally be having an impact upon those at the top. Just last week, Mark Goddard, head of Fifa’s transfer matching system, said: “It would be really good if we could have a verifiable, transparent, credible source as opposed to just back pages, and the soccer leaks website. In the end, the market finds out this information but they do it in a very unofficial, unstructured way and that really allows a lot of the opacity and the wheeling and dealing to be done. That’s a real shame.”
But will Fifa make the necessary changes? Will it create the reforms that can bring openness to football? The sad truth is that it is only when Fifa is ready to be open and honest about its own inner workings that it will have the impetus and credibility to demand change from the wider game.
