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Mino Raiola, well connected, much in demand
Photo:
ALBERT GEA / REUTERS
A few months ago, Mino Raiola granted the Sport 1 television channel an audience at his office in Monte Carlo.
The reporter was allowed to look at the James Bond memorabilia that the player's agent had piled up there, and Raiola said a sentence that was indicative of his mind: "If people hate me, then I'm happy.
Then I know I did a good job.«
So Mino Raiola must have done a very good job.
He was notorious among the clubs, Manchester icon Alex Ferguson called him a "shit guy", the "Bild" newspaper called him "football's biggest rabble-rouser" for the "world" he was "the most feared man in European football" .
Raiola will have taken note of this as an honorific.
The man, who died on Saturday at the age of 54 as a result of a serious lung disease, stood like no other for what the critics accuse modern football of.
The unbridled greed for money, the consulting system, the pursuit of super profits, the bartering of professionals, the backroom deals.
The fact that Raiola carried his mighty pot belly in front of him fitted perfectly with the image of an industry that is sometimes accused of mafia-like structures.
Raised almost 50 million euros from Pogba
Raiola let all of that bounce off her.
He has always emphasized that he only cares about the well-being of the players he represents.
And when in the end a consultant's fee totaling 49 million euros came up, as was the case with the transfer of France's Paul Pogba to Manchester United and was revealed by SPIEGEL's Football Leaks, then he just took it with him.
It is hardly surprising that the players who were under contract with Raiola hardly ever spoke a bad word about this alleged snarling tooth.
Understandably, they felt that they were well represented by him.
He cared for her and he cared for himself.
Raiola himself liked to tell the story that he once got a call in the middle of the night from a player, allegedly it was Mario Balotelli, telling him that there was a fire in his house.
The player had first called Raiola and then the fire department.
Long list of clients
The list of those who traded as Raiola clients was long and impressive: Zlatan Ibrahimović is among them, Swedish superstar, Pogba, Norway's Dortmunder Erling Haaland, currently one of the hottest commodities in European football, Balotelli and Gianluigi Donnarumma, Dutchman Mathijs De Ligt and Donyel Malen, formerly also Mark van Bommel.
At some point, Mino Raiola could no longer be avoided in the business, and hardly anyone dared to annoy him for a long time.
It is no coincidence that there are many Dutch people in his customer file.
It was from here that Raiola built his empire in the early 1990s, step by step, first working in the background and then putting himself in the front row.
From that moment on, it was clear that whoever was dealing with Mino Raiola had to be a damn good negotiator.
And in the end I had the feeling that the winner was sitting on the other side of the desk.
At the age of one, little Mino emigrated with his parents from Italy to the Netherlands.
His parents opened an Italian restaurant in Haarlem, Raiola helped out as a child, but it bothered him that many years later his opponents ridiculed him as a “pizza baker”.
On the road in six languages
He kept pointing out that he never stood at the stove himself, instead helping out with serving and chatting with the guests.
He learned early on that communication is important.
There is no text about Raiola that does not mention that the man spoke six languages.
He could easily switch from English to German, from Dutch to French.
Something like that impresses a counterpart.
Fifa boss Gianni Infantino also plays with this gift of multilingualism.
The fact that Raiola also preferred to appear in casual clothing for business appointments, that he received guests in his office in a T-shirt and baggy trousers, that he even didn't allow superstars to wait, all of this was active work on his reputation.
At some point he was
the
player advisor par excellence, whoever talked about the advisors had his striking figure in mind.
"I dress badly so that everyone will underestimate me and I'll make more money," he once said.
Even if this trick didn't work any more at some point: it still made more money out of it most of the time.
Raiola's rise began with the transfer of Dutch international Bryan Roy to Italy.
The Netherlands-Italy connection proved to be extremely fruitful for him, Raiola transferred Dennis Bergkamp to Inter Milan, so he had already reached a dimension that made him a major player in the consulting business.
Classic Raiola network
The transfer of Czech Pavel Nedved, one of the stars of Euro 1996, from Prague to Lazio Rome was his next journeyman.
Nedved had actually signed with PSV Eindhoven, Raiola untied the whole contract again, the player was first transferred to Kosice to move from there to Lazio.
A classic Raiola network, the advisor was the only one who had an overview of some transfers that were deliberately so entangled.
And knew how to earn multiple times.
Nedved joined Lazio for €3.7m and a few years later he moved to Juventus for €42m.
Borussia Dortmund made its experience with him when Raiola wanted to sever his client Henrich Mkhitaryan from BVB.
The consultant had a clause written into the Armenian's contract that would give him a share of the profits if the property was resold with added value.
Mkhitaryan came to Dortmund for a good 27 million and went to England for more than 42 million.
Mission accomplished.
In January, Raiola was hospitalized in Milan with a lung disease.
His condition recently deteriorated to such an extent that numerous international media reported his death on Thursday.
Which he then had denied via Twitter.
It was the last coup of the shrewd negotiator.
"Money is a result of good work," Raiola said.
Until the very end, he worked to ensure that a transfer from Haaland, or Borussia Dortmund, would ultimately be the result of good work.
Now he can no longer complete it.
When the news of the death was spread by the family in the afternoon, Raiola's protégé Haaland was on the pitch for BVB.
He scored three goals.
He may not have known it himself, but in hindsight it was also a reference for his advisor.
