Raiola: ‘Genius’ friend to the stars
DRESSED in a T-shirt and jeans or tracksuit and trainers, it is easy to mistake Mino Raiola for just another chubby beer-loving football fan rather than the razor-sharp mind who dominates the world transfer market.
Raiola, whose Italian roots and love of pasta is highlighted by his family’s pizza restaurant, is said to have been instrumental in orchestrating Belgian striker Romelu Lukaku’s signing at Manchester United for a reported £75million ($97 million) over the weekend.
The 24-year-old’s transfer from Everton – for a record fee between British clubs – was reportedly supported by another of Raiola’s proteges and Lukaku’s close friend, Paul Pogba.
It was Raiola who masterminded Pogba’s own record-smashing 105 million ($119 million) return to the Red Devils a year ago.
He has looked after Swedish great Zlatan Ibrahimovic for the past 15 years and also manages Mario Balotelli, Blaise Matuidi and Henrikh Mkhitaryan.
Raiola did extremely well out of United last year, making an estimated £40 million from Pogba’s transfer from Juventus alone, while stablemates Mkhitaryan and Ibrahimovic also joined at Old Trafford.
Raiola is “a man that always thinks ahead and he’s a perfectionist who’s always working unbelievably hard to get the best deals for his players”, Willem Vissers, a Dutch football writer for the respected daily De Volkskrant said.
Raiola was born into humble roots. His family owns a cosy, traditional pizza restaurant in the mediaeval Dutch city of Haarlem.
He first honed his skills in football and the art of negotiating while waiting tables at the Ristorante Napoli.
“The board of the [now defunct] local football club Haarlem FC used to come and dine there at least once a week,” said Edwin Struis, a freelance football writer who worked at a Haarlem paper in the early 1990s.
“Warranted or unwarranted, Mino would chirp in, giving his opinions on the state of the club and football in general,” Struis said. “It got to a point where they simply said: ‘Since you know so much, why don’t you just join the board?’” said Struis.
Raiola briefly worked as technical di- rector at Haarlem FC, but he had much grander ideas: setting up a partnership to transfer players from Italian club Napoli. Naples is close to the southern Italian city of Nocera Inferiore, from where Raiola moved with his parents when he was a year old in 1968.
Sopranos character
Many in football mistakenly brushed aside Raiola because of his informal attire.
Even Ibrahimovic in his autobiography I am Zlatan said he thought Raiola was a character from The Sopranos TV series when they first met.
“In t he beginning t hey a ll underestimated him because of the way he dressed,” said Vissers, who has inter v iewed the elusive agent and been a keen follower of his career.
These days, nobody dismisses Raiola, one of the most powerful people in football. His first big break came with the signing of Czech midfield star Pavel Nedved, a former Ballon d’Or winner, in 1992. After that, other greats like Ibrahimovic and Pogba – and now Lukaku – followed.
It is not all plain sailing for Raiola, however. The Football Leaks media consortium alleged late last year that the agent had transferred Pogba’s multimillion image rights to the offshore haven of Jersey. The agent has dismissed the reports as imaginary.
Raiola’s own income and tendency to shoot from the hip has earned him the admiration – and ire – of many in football.
“Unfortunately, he’s made it a bit of a habit to insult people,” Struis said.
Five years ago Barcelona threatened to break ties with Raiola after he criticised their then coach Pep Guardiola over his deteriorating relationship with Ibrahimovic.
He crossed the line for many in the Netherlands when he called late national football icon Johan Cruyff a “demented d—head” for allegedly suggesting that ex-footballers should be given top football industry jobs.
Raiola later apologised to Cruyff, but said he stood by his views on the Ajax legend’s idea.
And Ibrahimovic has only good things to say in his autobiography.
“Shall I spell it out here? Mino is a genius,” said the world’s third highest earning footballer in 2016 after Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi.