Jorge Mendes – agent to the stars
MADRID: Two decades ago, he was a budding entrepreneur making a living from managing a video club and discotheques.
Today, at the age of 51, Jorge Mendes operates in a hypermoneyed world inhabited by top sportsmen as agent to the stars -- including Cristiano Ronaldo.
But all is no longer well among the gilded megastars advised by the man who has been elected “best agent of the year” several times at the Globe Soccer Awards.
Mendes appeared in court near Madrid Tuesday for questioning over striker Radamel Falcao’s alleged tax evasion, just one of his clients to fall foul of Spain’s judiciary.
Monaco’s Falcao is suspected of failing to correctly declare 5.6 million euros ($ 6.3 million) of income earned from image rights between 2012 and 2013 while at Atletico Madrid.
The Colombian is accused of using a web of shell companies in the British Virgin Islands, Ireland, Colombia and Panama to avoid taxes.
Ronaldo, the world’s highest paid athlete according to Forbes, is due to be questioned on July 31 after allegedly evading 14.7 million euros in taxes.
Fabio Coentrao, the Portugal international who also plays for Real Madrid, is suspected of having hidden close to 1.3 million euros.
And Manches ter Uni ted manager Jose Mourinho, another Mendes client, has been accused of failing to pay millions in taxes during his time in charge of Real Madrid. Nicknamed “the shark” by rival agents, the diminutive Mendes has a penchant for being discreet -- he keeps his head down and rarely gives interviews.
When he does surface he is generally seen phone in hand or clamped to his ear wheeling and dealing for his stable of some 100 players or coaches whose interests he manages.
Yet Mendes has been front page news since an international consortium of media organisations highlighted a huge data leak purporting to show that Ronaldo, Mourinho and others kept millions of earnings out of the taxman’s reach in havens.
Mendes, whose company, Ges t i fut e I nt er n at iona l , is registered in Ireland, has vigorously denied any wrongdoing.
He was one of the first to exploit player rights through third parties such as investment funds -- a practice FIFA has now made illegal. — AFP