Football rife with corruption, agents tell court
‘99 per cent of the industry is made up of people that, if they weren’t in football, would be selling second-hand cars’
A FOOTBALL agent boasted of giving Sir Alex Ferguson a £30,000 gold Rolex watch as a backhander and claimed the sport was rife with corruption, a jury heard yesterday.
Giueseppe “Pino” Pagliara, 64, was recorded as part of a Telegraph undercover investigation saying he had opened numerous Swiss bank accounts for football managers to provide “bungs” to secure player transfers, Southwark Crown Court was told.
Brian O’neill, QC, prosecuting, said agents Mr Pagliara and Dax Price, 48, set up meetings between Claire Newell, an undercover journalist posing as a businesswoman,
Steve Mcclaren, the ex-england coach, Nwankwo
Kanu, an Arsenal player, and Harry Redknapp, the ex-spurs boss, in an attempt to
“impress” her.
During meetings at top hotels in London, Leeds and Manchester, Mr Pagliara was recorded telling Ms Newell how he would “look after managers”, adding that “99 per cent of the industry is made up of people that, if they weren’t in football, would be selling second-hand cars”.
Mr O’neill stressed how he did not want to “malign” the “prominent figures” Mr Pagliara and Mr Price suggested were “corrupt”. The details were included because it showed the agents’ “knowledge or beliefs” about corruption and their willingness to “embrace and exploit” it, he said.
In one recording, Mr Pagliara launched a “diatribe” about Sir Alex, the former Manchester United manager, “accusing him of conspiring with Pagliara to fix the result of a match between Juventus, a club Pagliara was associated with, and Manchester United in the Champions’ League for which Paligara had thanked him with a gold, 30 grand Rolex watch”.
Mr O’neill added: “Pagliara accused Alex Ferguson of having taken money as part of transfer deals saying he would only work with agents used to sharing money with him. He claimed he had paid Ferguson before.”
It was claimed “the plan” the agent was espousing would appear “to the outside world” as though the player was owned by the club, but really belonged to a “third party” – the agents, who then profited from the onward sale of the footballer to the Premier League for millions of pounds.
Third-party ownership of players was banned by the Football Association in 2009 and then Fifa, football’s governing body, in 2015.
However, in an email to the reporter, Mr Pagliara was said to have written “Third-party ownership is the driving force of football.”
He was recorded saying he had opened offshore accounts to provide payments to managers, adding that it used to be done with “a bag of cash” saying “in football it’s all under the table”.
Mr O’neill said Mr Pagliara claimed Antonio Conte, the then Chelsea manager, had once asked, “Is there a little coffee for me, Pino?” explaining how a payment would be “disguised” as a “consultancy agreement”.
Mr O’neill said Mr Pagliara added: “We are not talking an espresso.” The third defendant, Tommy Wright, 53, was said to have accepted a “cash bribe” to get players to sign up with the agents while he was the assistant head coach of Barnsley. It was claimed £5,000 cash was given to him in an envelope by Ms Newell as a “bribe” for “commercial information about Barnsley’s players”.
The jury heard how Ms Newell set up a fake company called Merian Sports Management, adding that “misrepresentation and subterfuge” can be justified if in the “public interest in exposing crime or serious impropriety”.
The “football for sale” story was published in September 2016 and resulted in Sam Allardyce resigning as England’s manager.
Mr Price, a former Middlesbrough player, was said to have claimed managers receive “backhanders” to secure player deals, adding: “It’s not corruption but you know it is corruption.”
At another meeting, Mr Pagliara was heard to ask the reporter where her phone was, adding: “Oh, you’re not recording anything are you?”
Mr Wright, 53, from Barnsley, South Yorkshire, denies two counts of accepting a bribe.
Mr Pagliara, from Bury in Greater Manchester, and Mr Price, from Sittingbourne, Kent, deny two counts of paying and facilitating a bribe.
The trial continues.