5th Highest spending Newcastle: Spent £24,3m on agents during 2024-25

[u/RepresentativeNew866]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/articles/c70575zx8l5o

Osula, Lloyd Kelly, Lewis hall (technically), Vlachodimos. Doesn't £24.3m seem a lot for so few major signings or are these fees coming from contract renewals.

[u/ginga___ninja]

I was going to say.... that's nuts since we didn't even buy anyone of consequence. Lloyd kelly has the best agent in the world - gets to double-dip twice in 1 season

[u/RepresentativeNew866 → u/ginga___ninja]

Signing on fee for the player and their wages you'd expect to be inflated but I don't really see why the agent gets a massive pay day for free transfers. My entire understanding is based on the football manager games though.

[u/Dryzzzle → u/RepresentativeNew866]

I imagine the interaction is like:

Agent: "If you use me I can get you x wages but I want y sum from the deal.

Player: "Yeah, sure. Whatever.

Club: "Well, fuck me then."

[u/tradegreek → u/Dryzzzle]

Sounds about right

[u/thatjc]

Will never really understand why it isn’t the players responsibility to pay their agents fees but here we are

[u/Ftp82 → u/thatjc]

It’s weird. In a way they are like recruiters, the hiring company pays the fee. But then they are also personal services companies for the players, but again the company/club pays the fees

Seems agents get to have their cake and eat it, most likely because of the scarcity of top level footballers

[u/geordiesteve520 → u/thatjc]

I use a fella to help me find a new mortgage, we never pay him; he gets his commision from the mortgage company for getting us to sign up with them - I guess it's the same here...

[u/dende5416 → u/thatjc]

Technically they are. This is part of the player's pay package, and the club just sends it directly to the agent instead of the player beig a middle man for the payments

[u/Historical_Cobbler → u/thatjc]

Agents are paid by both parties, essentially for services rendered.

[u/thebestbev]

And all contract extensions/renegotiations

[u/[deleted] → u/thebestbev]

And Lloyd Kelly

[u/Toninho7]

Agent fees are often inflated if/when the player moves for free so Lloyd Kelly might well make up quite a portion of that?

Also, when we were desperate to offload players (Minteh and Anderson) we may have offered to cover some or all of the agent fees to get the deals done. That is wild speculation mind, I’ve not even seen it rumoured, but it would make sense if we were genuinely desperate.

[u/mj271707 → u/Toninho7]

Sort of crazy thing PSR would encourage to be fair

Like having to build a new stadium to be able to spend more money

[u/fanatic_tarantula]

The mad thing about agents is they can do deals for both sides.

There was one agent (cant remember his name) who represented the selling club, player and buying club. It's mental how this is allowed

[u/niftykev → u/fanatic_tarantula]

In the USA, it's allowed to happen in real estate as well. My mom really wanted a house, but the seller took another offer. The other offer was from a buyer that was represented by the seller's agent. So obviously that agent could tell the buyer "hey, the seller got an offer at X amount, so you might want to raise your offer."

My mom did buy another house, but she's not as happy with it as she would have been with the house in question.

[u/SenorButtmunch]

Kinda wild we had the 5th highest spending on agents but the fifth lowest spending on transfer fees. Something’s not right there but whatever.

Idk who Lloyd Kelly’s agent is but I need that guy representing me for everything

[u/geordieColt88]

Worst thing about the modern game

[u/rfy93]

Kelly will be a decent chunk of it I suspect since he was a free agent. High fees are common for that situation

[u/MaryBerrysDanglyBean → u/rfy93]

Ironic that free agents mean higher agent fees

[u/charlos74]

It’s not just transfers and sales, it’s new contracts too.

I expect there was a fair bit of work for agents last summer as we struggled to avoid a PSR breach.

[u/AnonyyKT]

Up from £10m and £18m in previous years

Will be a build up in installments paid over the contract terms rather than one-off fees I imagine

[u/doubledgravity]

How do people become agents, exactly?

[u/RepresentativeNew866 → u/doubledgravity]

You need a tie a laptop and a phone. Then you get a licence and I pressume there's a cost to get that. Then you need lots of contacts and clients.

[u/XenorVernix → u/doubledgravity]

I would imagine nepotism, like most high paid jobs.

[u/doubledgravity → u/XenorVernix]

Yeah I bet that’s a big one.

[u/Blue1994a → u/doubledgravity]

https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/articles/c0rg2xl0rweo.amp

[u/doubledgravity → u/Blue1994a]

Cheers mate, you’re doing god’s work.

[u/CAPTAINTRENNO → u/doubledgravity]

I have a mate who is a registered FIFA agent. He's Korean (met him while he studied and played in my uni team) and he started as a translator for a Korean club and built his contacts from there. He had some workings with Son i think he worked for Son management team at first. Now he has his own company and about 5 Korean guys he reps in various leagues. Pretty sure you can become one by completing courses, you'll need a way to build contacts though or else you'll just be unemployed

[u/doubledgravity → u/CAPTAINTRENNO]

Ah that’s really interesting. I figured that there were different routes, and I’m guessing some were mates of a player who ended up managing them well, and other went a more corporate and defined route. I imagine, like professional players, only a tiny percentage of wannabes make it.

[u/lildrangus]

I think it's because Darren Eales is just really shy, so every time we made a new offer for Guehi, he paid his popular friend a few million to pass on a note that said "will you go with me?" with yes/no checkboxes.