Manchester United’s relationship with player agent Mino Raiola is getting hotter after Norwegian striker Erling Braut Haaland failed to anchor at Old Trafford and chose to join Borussia Dortmund.
Haaland became a Dortmund player after signing a contract with the Bundesliga club on Sunday (29/12). Together with Die Borusse,n Haaland got a four and a half season contract until 2024.
Quoted from the US based on the Guardian’s report, Manchester United was reluctant to recruit Haaland because his agent, Raiola, asked for a high commission from the transfer.
Raiola is said to want a fee of 15 million Euros in the agreement. The commission was only 5 million Euros different from the nominal received by RB Salzburg, 20 million Euros.
Because of these factors, Manchester United feels Raiola is not a figure that supports Manchester United related relationships with the players under his care, quoted from Express.
The super agent also reportedly wants a commission from the sale value in the future if the player joins Manchester U. In addition, MU also worried that Raiola had a bad influence on the players, so the players chose to leave Old Trafford.
Midfielder Paul Pogba is one example of Raiola’s bad influence. In this season Pogba is often rumored to leave from MU in the mid-season transfer market.
To the media, Raiola always blew up the issue of Pogba who was not at home at MU and the great chances of the French national team midfielder joining Real Madrid or Juventus.
Raiola’s career as a player agent began at the Sports Promotions company by ‘selling’ Dutch players to Italian clubs. One of them was Dennis Bergkamp who moved to Inter Milan in 1993.
Satisfied working in a company of people, Raiola decided to work with his own ‘flag’. Pavel Nedved’s move from Sparta Prague to Lazio in 1996 became Raiola’s biggest transfer at the time.
Now, Raiola is in charge of a number of soccer stars who make his name into the ranks of ‘super agents’. The world’s top players with Raiola include: Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Paul Pogba, Marco Verrati, Matthijs de Ligt, and Erling Haaland.
To date, the biggest transfer Raiola made was when Pogba moved to Manchester United from Juventus in 2016.
The Pogba transfer is said to have made the Italian-born agent a profit of 25 million Euros.
Apart from his success in having a series of stars, Raiola is also famous as an agent who is hostile to a number of big European clubs.
Apart from Manchester United, Barcelona have also felt the bad influence of Raiola when he failed to get Matthijs de Ligt from Ajax Amsterdam at the start of this season.
In fact, when the Blaugrana offered a higher price for De Ligt. However, Juventus management is smarter to take the day Raiola who made the Dutch national team defender move to Turin.
Juventus not only benefited from Raiola but also lost. When Pogba moved to Manchester United, the Old Lady claimed to be upset with Raiola because midfielder Blaise Matuidi failed to move to Juventus.
However, the 52-year-old agent clarified Matuidi’s failure at Juventus not because of him, but rather due to pressure from PSG officials. Matuidi himself finally moved to Juventus a few seasons later.
