‘Cardiff are trying to blame me for crash’
Mckay says ‘conscience is clear’ over Sala death Club prepared to sue over ‘price inflation’
A “livid” Willie Mckay last night accused Cardiff City of “trying to throw me under the bus” as the bitter recriminations over the tragic transfer of Emiliano Sala intensified.
The man who brokered Sala’s move to the Welsh club lashed out at their owner, chairman and chief executive, claiming that they were attempting to shift blame for the striker’s death in a plane crash on to “an easy target”.
As exclusively revealed by The Sunday Telegraph, Cardiff are ready to launch a negligence claim against Nantes, the club who sold Sala to them, if an official report finds the pilot of the plane did not have the correct licence.
They are also prepared to sue Mckay personally over his self-confessed bid to “create an interest” in the 28-year-old in what they consider to be potential price inflation.
And they have refused to rule out calling for the Football Association, Fifa and even the police to investigate the £15million deal, on which they have frozen payments.
With Sala’s cousin, Martin Gatti, claiming at the weekend that the striker “was killed”, and his former girlfriend, Berenice Schkair, appearing to restate an earlier call for the former authorities to “investigate the football mafia” over his death, the fallout over his plane crash shows no sign of abating.
Mckay, who arranged the flight, came out fighting yesterday, insisting his “conscience was clear” and revealing he was “livid” over his treatment. Accusing Cardiff owner Vincent Tan, chairman Mehmet Dalman and chief executive Ken Choo of “trying to throw me under the bus”, he told The Daily Telegraph: “Cardiff City have shown no class at all.”
Mckay had previously angered the club after releasing an email he had sent to Sala admitting planting “misleading” stories in the media about interest in him from Premier League teams including Everton and West Ham.
He went further yesterday by providing the Telegraph with the contract between Nantes and his agent son, Mark, which confirmed the latter was due 10 per cent of any transfer fee – around £1.5million.
The document also stipulates
‘I met Emiliano as many times as [Cardiff officials]. I tried to help him. They never tried’
that Mckay Jnr must “make every effort” to ensure the French club receive the full amount of that fee “as soon as possible”.
Mckay confirmed, too, that he had spoken to the Air Accidents Investigation Branch about Sala’s fatal journey on Jan 21 and had produced a timeline of all previous private plane trips arranged as part of the transfer.
This timeline, which he shared with the Telegraph, shows his son had organised and paid for two earlier flights to Nantes for Cardiff manager Neil Warnock to watch the striker and two between the cities for the player himself, the first for contract talks and the second for his medical.
Mckay said: “The only flight everybody is talking about is the one that crashed, right? Cardiff knew everything [about every flight]. When are they going to come out and tell the truth?”
Mckay confirmed none of the four previous journeys had used the same Piper Malibu plane or pilot involved in last month’s crash. The Scot has repeatedly stressed he neither owns the doomed plane nor had any input into the selection of it or the pilot. Instead, he says, he simply asked one of his regular pilots, Dave Henderson, to make all the necessary arrangements.
He claimed yesterday still not to know who owned the plane or whether the pilot, David Ibbotson – who also died in the tragedy and whose body has not been found – was licensed to make a commercial flight or had been paid anything more than expenses.
Mckay said he routinely funded the flights and hotels of players he was contracted to sell – and even managers he was trying to sell them to – listing the practice among “gambles” he took in the hope of securing a lucrative payday.
He denied Sala had been overpriced, claiming Nantes were only due half his transfer fee because of a sell-on clause and that £15 million actually “wasn’t a good deal” for the French club.
Asked why he was even involved in that deal given he was declared bankrupt in 2015 and no longer held an intermediaries licence, Mckay declared it was down to “nepotism” and to help “open some doors” for his agent son.
He also revealed he had attended Sala’s funeral in Argentina on Saturday, taking the same flight as Choo, and that he met the player’s brother while there.
He added: “I met Emiliano the same amount of times as they [Cardiff officials] met him. I organised his flight. I tried to help him. They never tried to help him.
“They booked him one room at the St David’s Hotel [in Cardiff ]. That’s all they’ve done for him. And they’re trying to throw me under the bus.”
Meanwhile, the AAIB confirmed yesterday its interim report into Sala’s plane crash would not be ready this week but that a publication date could be confirmed by Friday.