By David Owen in Zurich
October 25 – Agents’ fees could be capped at three per cent under new rules being drawn up by FIFA, world football’s governing body.
Omar Ongaro, a member of FIFA’s legal affairs unit, told the International Football Arena conference in Zurich the proposed cap could be set at $2 million (£1.2 million) or three per cent of a player’s gross salary.
He suggested this compared with an average of about 10 per cent at present.
Ongaro said a draft of the new proposals had already been presented to FIFA’s Legal Committee and would go before the players’ Status Committee tomorrow.
It was possible they could then be put to FIFA’s ruling Executive Committee in March, with a view to securing approval by Congress next summer.
If that happened, they might enter into force in October 2011.
Ongaro said there was a realisation that the current system “is not properly working”.
“We cannot have jurisdiction over non-licensed agents” and lawyers authorised to represent without a licence, he said.
Under the proposed new scheme, agents – or “intermediaries” as they would be known – would no longer require a licence, but players would have to register the intermediary used in each transaction with the national association with which his or her club was affiliated.
Rob Jansen, President of the European Football Agents Associations, said he thought the proposals would lead to “total chaos”.
Agents have assumed an increasingly prominent role in elite club football in recent times, as illustrated most recently last week by the saga that preceded Wayne Rooney’s new deal (pictured) with Manchester United.
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